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DECK AND FIELD 



DECK AND FIELD 

ADDRESSES BEFORE THE UNITED 
STATES NAVAL WAR COLLEGE AND 
ON COMMEMORATIVE OCCASIONS 

BY 

FRANK WARREN HACKETT 



" For what avail the plow or sail 
Or land or life if freedom faiV 




W. H. LOWDERMILK & COMPANY 
WASHINGTON 

1909 






COPYRIGHT, I9O9, BY FRANK W. HACKETT 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



ISHESSj 

»C«i*<S« I 



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TO 

ROBERT MEANS THOMPSON 

A GRADUATE OF 

THE UNITED STATES NAVAL ACADEMY 

CLASS OF 1868 

WHO HAS FOR MANY YEARS IN CIVIL LIFE 

PROVED HIMSELF A CONSTANT AND 

GENEROUS FRIEND OF 

THE NAVY 



PREFATORY NOTE 

Public addresses, however interesting at the 
time of their delivery, seldom get further 
than the printed pamphlet. For those here 
brought together, no claim of special liter- 
ary merit is set up. The two delivered be- 
fore the Naval War College, at Newport, in 
1 900 and 1 90 1, while the author was holding 
the office of Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 
deal chiefly with qualities demanded of the 
naval officer of the present period. It is con- 
ceived that there may be here and there 
a reader who will be glad to possess these 
views — such as they are — in a convenient 
form. 

As for the other addresses, let me say that 
the office of most of them has been to re- 
flect the feelings entertained by the Ameri- 
can people, a generation after the conflict 
had ended, toward the memory of men who 
had fought to preserve the Union. One is 
encouraged to believe that words uttered in 
such circumstances may not be altogether 
without historic value. At all events, it is a 



viii PREFATORY NOTE 

pleasure to think that there is still living 
an old sailor, or soldier, who shall find some- 
thing in these heartfelt expressions that will 
kindle anew his affection for the days of '61. 

My obligations are gratefully acknow- 
ledged for the kindness of the District of 
Columbia Commandery of the Military 
Order of the Loyal Legion of the United 
States in granting me permission to reprint 
papers originally prepared at their invita- 
tion. 

My friends, Rear Admiral Joseph Nelson 
Miller, U. S. N., and Robert Means Thomp- 
son, of New York City, have each furnished 
valuable and interesting material (to be 
found in the Appendix), for which I heart- 
ily thank them. To Lieutenant-Commander 
Noble E. Irwin, U. S. N., I am indebted 
for interesting details as to the Thompson 
Trophy Cup, at the Naval Academy, An- 
napolis. 

Washington, January, 1909. 



CONTENTS 

I. Address delivered before the Naval War College, 
Newport, Rhode Island, June 2, 1900 . . . 3-16 

II. Address delivered before the Naval War College, 
Newport, Rhode Island, June 3, 1901 . . . 19-38 

III. Address at presentation by the State of New 
Hampshire of the Kearsarge -Alabama Tablets, 
Portsmouth, New Hampshire, September 18, 
19 00 41-45 

IV. Address at Flag Day Exercises, Washington, 
District of Columbia, June 14, 1901 . . . 49-57 

V. Address at the base of the Washington Monu- 
ment before the Society of the Sons of the Revo- 
lution, Washington, District of Columbia, July 4, 
1893 61-70 

VI. Address at unveiling of tablet in memory of 
Admiral David Glasgow Farragut, U. S. N., Navy 
Yard, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, August 26, 
1908 73-81 

VII. Address at unveiling of tablet in memory of Rear 
Admiral Richard Worsam Meade, U. S. N., 
Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland, May 30, 
1901 85-97 



x CONTENTS 

VIII. Address at unveiling of tablet in memory of Cap- 
tain Thomas Tingey, U. S. N., Navy Yard, 
Washington, District of Columbia, November 
28, 1906 ioi-iii 

IX. Paper commemorating Lieutenant-Commander 
Charles Williamson Flusser, U. S. N., read before 
District of Columbia Commandery of the Loyal 
Legion, Washington, November 1, 1899 . 1 15-142 

X. Address in memory of President William McKin- 
ley before District of Columbia Commandery of 
the Loyal Legion, Washington, November 6, 
i9 01 i45~ I 5 I 

XL Memorial Tribute to Lieutenant-General John 
McAllister Schofield, U. S. A., prepared for Dis- 
trict of Columbia Commandery of the Loyal 
Legion, Washington, January 1, 1908 . . 155-161 

XII. Memorial Address before Storer Post Number 
One, Grand Army of the Republic, Portsmouth, 
New Hampshire, May 30, 1892 .... 165-179 



APPENDIX 

I. William Thomas Sampson 183-184 

II. Buell's Life of John Paul Jones .... 185-192 
III. Peter Hagner 193-195 



CONTENTS xi 

IV. The Farragut Tablet: — 

I. Prayer of Chaplain Frank Thompson, 

U. S. N 196-197 

11. Remarks of Admiral George Dewey, 

U. S. N 197-198 

m. Letter of Rear Admiral John Crittenden 
Watson, U. S. N 199-203 

V. The Thompson Trophy at the United States 
Naval Academy 204-207 

VI. Letter of Rear Admiral Joseph Nelson Miller, 
U. S. N., August 7, 1900, giving reminiscences 
of Lieutenant-Commander Charles Williamson 
Flusser, U. S. N 208-212 

VII. Henry Lakeman Richards 214-215 

Index of Names 219-222 



I 

NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 
1900 



ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE 
NAVAL WAR COLLEGE 

NEWPORT RHODE ISLAND JUNE 2 1900 

[The Assistant Secretary of the Navy had accepted 
with pleasure an invitation to deliver the address at 
the annual June opening of the Naval War College. 
He reached Newport in the U. S. S. Dolphin. 

A fine audience completely filled the hall. Conspic- 
uous among the officers present were Rear Admiral 
Luce, U. S. N., and Rear Admiral Farquhar, U. S. N., 
Commander-in-Chief of the North Atlantic Squadron, 
together with his staff. Most of the officers of the 
flagship New York and battleship Texas were also there. 
All the officers at the College and those of the Training 
School and Torpedo Station attended, as well as a large 
number of officers of the Army, and several civilians. 

The President of the War College, Captain Charles 
Herbert Stockton, U. S. N., introduced the speaker. 
A reception was held at the close of the address, 
and a luncheon followed, largely attended, at the 
house of Captain Asa Walker, U. S. N., of the War 
College.] 

Mr. President, and Gentlemen of the 
War College: — 
The twelvemonth just past has proved 
a busy year in national affairs. For the first 



4 DECK AND FIELD 

time since the formation of the Government 
has it fallen to the President to send from 
our shores to an island of the sea a civil 
governor, who should in his person repre- 
sent the dignity and power of the United 
States. Fortunately for us, and fortunately 
for Porto Rico, the Chief Executive was at 
no loss whither to turn. 

A judgment so sound, and an address so 
pleasing, had characterized the administra- 
tion of Assistant Secretary Allen that the 
President bade him lay aside his work for 
the Navy, and hasten to San Juan with a 
message of good will. 

You who have witnessed the success at- 
tendant upon his efforts for the welfare of 
the service need not be reminded how com- 
pletely to Mr. Allen's taste was the work in 
which he had become engrossed. You may 
well understand with what reluctance he has 
abandoned these congenial duties in order 
to take up larger responsibilities in an un- 
familiar field. The new governor yielded to 
the choice of the President from a dictate 
of duty. He was sorry to leave the Depart- 
ment, and everybody there was sorry to part 
from him. Let us rejoice, however, that the 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 5 

people of Porto Rico are setting out upon 
their new political life under the guidance 
of so gallant a leader. 

Standing here as the successor of Assist- 
ant Secretary Allen, I share your regret that 
to-day does not find him with you, speaking 
words of counsel and encouragement. It 
is a pleasing office assigned to the Assist- 
ant Secretary, that he shall come to New- 
port, and by his presence at the opening 
exercises testify to the unabated interest felt 
by the Department in the growth in useful- 
ness of the Naval War College. So far as 
good wishes avail, permit me to assure you 
that I bring them in fullest measure. 

This institution, young as it is, has amply 
justified its existence. No thoughtful ob- 
server, I feel sure, whether in or out of the 
service, can fail to perceive that, as graver 
problems of naval administration from time 
to time present themselves, under conditions 
ever varying, they demand for solution in- 
fluences that can be fostered and perfected 
only through means to be supplied by a 
college such as this. 

For the privilege of responding to your 
invitation, I am duly grateful. The occasion 



6 DECK AND FIELD 

demands the best that one has to give. I am 
not a little concerned, however, as to the line 
of thought adapted to my capacities, and 
therefore most appropriate to pursue. It is 
usually expected of an opening address that 
it shall strike a keynote. This, I confess, I 
cannot do. Surely it is not for a worker taken 
up on the rolls at the eleventh hour to harbor 
any such ambitious purpose. 

It was of Lord John Russell, you remem- 
ber, that Sydney Smith rather teasingly said: 

There is not a better man in England, but his 
worst failure is that he is utterly ignorant of all 
moral fear ; there is nothing that he would not 
undertake. I believe he would perform the opera- 
tion for the stone, build St. Peter's, or assume 
(with or without ten minutes' notice) the command 
of the Channel Fleet ; and no one would discover 
by his manner that the patient had died, the 
church tumbled down, and the Channel Fleet 
been knocked to atoms. 

There may be Lord Johns in the country 
at large, but we have not been making assist- 
ant secretaries of them — at least, not lately. 
With your permission, then, I shall speak 
from the standpoint of the average American 
citizen. 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 7 

Our Navy has never been intrenched 
more firmly in the popular heart than at this 
very hour. Time was when admiration for 
our sailors found a home chiefly along the 
seaboard, but to-day it knows no bounds of 
locality. Coast and interior alike pulsate 
with a thrill of patriotic fervor for glorious 
achievement. The peaks of the Rockies, as 
it were, catch the spray of inspiration. No 
village in the land is so remote that the guns 
of Dewey and of Sampson 1 have not awak- 
ened gladdening echoes within its borders. 

The average American citizen, though he 
may be a little mystified at its technique, is 
proud of the Navy. The factory hand at the 
loom, the miner delving with the pick, the 
settler as he drives a furrow through virgin 
soil, each voicing that intelligence wherein 
lies the hope of the Republic, feels somehow 
that for him the Oregon in Manila Bay, the 
Kearsarge and the Alabama (names now 
linked in perpetual love for the Union), 
mean protection and peace. He is conscious 
that their sleeping force warrants a surer 
return for his honest toil. 

Let a word or two be said, therefore, in 

1 See Appendix I. 



8 DECK AND FIELD 

harmony with this broader apprehension by 
our whole people of what the Navy stands 
for. Now that the sphere of our responsibil- 
ity as a nation has widened, and populations 
heretofore strange to us rely upon the pro- 
tection of the American flag for an advance 
of civilization, and for the blessings of a stable 
government with political freedom, it is plain 
that new duties are required, and will con- 
tinue to be required, of our commanding 
officers in distant waters. It behooves us, 
then, to ponder well the inquiry, How shall 
the naval officer of the near future best meet 
the demands that his country has laid upon 
him? Such is the question you study here 
to answer. 

It is curious to note that two branches of 
the service which have so much in common 
should differ widely when brought to a de- 
finition. Speak of the Army, and we call 
before us a body of men armed and trained. 
Speak of the Navy, and we picture to our- 
selves ships armed and furnished with officers 
and crews. That is to say, while the former 
means men, the latter brings up the material 
instruments with which men work — a ship 
and her guns — rather than the man him- 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 9 

self. But the world has personified a ship 
from the days of Homer down. The custom 
ought not to blind one to the truth that the 
ship and her armament is, after all, but so 
much inert matter. It is the man, the brain 
of man, that is everything. 

You will pardon the allusion, but never 
shall I forget the experience of one bright, 
lovely afternoon in May when I saw a double- 
ender gunboat, her flag to the breeze aloft, 
dashing like a race-horse — almost leaping 
— through the waters of a Carolina sound, 
until she crashed upon the iron sides of our 
formidable antagonist, the rebel ram Albe- 
marle. It was not the Sassacus, but the in- 
trepid Roe, that did the deed. 

That we may have peace, you teach war. 
You hold officers to the one central fact, 
that the Navy means organized preparation 
to crush an enemy. It means that men and 
material are ready upon the instant. 

When Napoleon was asked why his first 
Italian campaign was the most successful of 
all his campaigns, his reply was : " Because 
it was most carefully studied out before- 
hand." All the book-learning in the world 
might fail to create a successful captain, and 



io DECK AND FIELD 

yet the leader who can profit by the expe- 
rience of others has the advantage of him 
who relies altogether upon his own intui- 
tions. 

So here you proclaim that study and hard 
thinking are in order. A battle on land or 
water means that somebody has been work- 
ing out a plan. In time these various plans 
have evolved rules and maxims based on 
certain principles that prove of more or less 
value as guides for future action. What these 
rules are, how best to apply them, when they 
can be safely violated — these, and such as 
these, are vital topics with which the Naval 
War College deals. All that is intellectual 
in the make-up of the officer responds gladly 
to the prospect of an exercise thus invigo- 
rating and broadening. 

In war, as in every other struggle, the 
test of success is that the commander works 
out the largest results possible with the in- 
strument put into his hands. He that waits 
that he may have something better to go 
ahead with never wins a battle. The effective 
force to be got out of a ship depends on the 
man who handles her. These, to be sure, are 
but commonplace observations, but, never- 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS n 

theless, the idea they embody ought ever to 
be present to the mind of an officer fit to 
command. 

Obviously, the naval profession lies open 
to very much the same influences that oper- 
ate in other professions. If there be a lead- 
ing factor that accounts for the marvelous 
changes in the latter half of the century now 
hastening to a close, we shall recognize it in 
the multiform facilities for intercommuni- 
cation that have come into being. People 
sometimes say that the world is smaller than 
it used to be. The truth is that, while dis- 
tances seem smaller, the world, as comprising 
the circle within which people move about, 
is larger than ever before. A man lives over 
a wider range of territory, and comes into 
actual contact with incalculably more people 
than did his grandfather, or even his father. 
The problems of the hour are not only 
more intricate, but far more numerous, than 
those of five and twenty years ago. Hence, 
if one would master a few subjects, instead 
of getting a superficial acquaintance with 
many, he must give up the hope of covering 
a wide field. He becomes a specialist. Such 
is the inexorable decree of these later days. 



12 DECK AND FIELD 

In business or in science, the few who stand 
at the head have gained distinction by reason 
of knowing more about some one thing than 
anybody else. 

In the slow and painstaking process of 
training officers of the Navy, can we hope 
to escape the workings of this law? Observe, 
I refrain from expressing an opinion. I 
merely submit the inquiry whether it be the 
part of wisdom to attempt to run counter 
to the workings of what clearly is the trend 
of development in the higher walks of busi- 
ness, of science, and of the learned profes- 
sions. 

There can be no lowering of the standard. 
Matchless as is the record of past achieve- 
ment, the captain of the future must subject 
himself to a test even more rigid. He shall 
evince more ardor than Paul Jones ; more 
skill than Hull; more daring than Decatur; 
more firmness than Farragut. 

First, and always, he shall be a sailor — 
shall excel in seamanship. Sails and top- 
gallant masts have disappeared, but the mys- 
tery of the ocean remains. To read wind and 
current ; to have his ship in hand through 
storm and calm; to keep her stanch and 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 13 

trim, and at her best — this is to be in truth 
a sailor. The aphorism of better than a cen- 
tury ago has not lost its point, that " The 
winds and waves are always on the side of 
the ablest navigators." 

Your officer is to carry a stout heart — 
shrink from nothing — take the risk. He 
must harbor a comprehension of that mira- 
cle of human ingenuity beneath his feet, the 
modern battleship — her build, her motive 
power, her every capacity, her death-dealing 
guns, her armor shield, her nicely adjusted 
mechanisms, the almost countless nerves 
trembling with life and meaning. He must 
be able to boast some acquaintance with 
chemistry, electricity, hygiene, some famil- 
iarity with diplomacy, and with the outlines 
of international law. We would have him 
conversant with human nature under a blue 
flannel shirt. A master of discipline, it will 
go hard with him if he do not possess deci- 
sion of character to a rare degree of perfec- 
tion. 

See what a list of virtues you are making 
out for the brain of one man to keep in ex- 
ercise. If a note of warning lurk in these 
suggestions, it is that we take precious good 



i 4 DECK AND FIELD 

care lest our gentlemen of the Navy be 
required to accomplish too much. 

Dr. Johnson is every now and then quoted 
as having said: " Knowledge is of two kinds. 
We know a subject ourselves, or we know 
where we can find information upon it." In 
like manner, it is to be observed that, while 
the commander of a ship may have mastered 
fairly well one or two subdivisions of the 
many affairs under his control, he sees that 
for this or that other department, of which 
he knows something, he can rely upon a 
subordinate who is specially trained therein. 

Let us avoid imposing upon a ranking 
officer a burden of multitudinous details. 
His talent and energy are pledged to a 
service infinitely more important. His busi- 
ness is to study deep, and again and again 
to reflect upon, the problem how to perfect 
himself in the use of that which his country 
has intrusted to him wherewith to meet and 
destroy the enemy. This it is to compass 
the art of war in a larger aspect, to rise above 
what is petty, and to deal with what is grand 
and enduring. 

You will observe that thus far we have 
had in mind the commander of a single ship 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 15 

only. A course of training to fit the officer 
for this responsible post is begun at the 
Naval Academy, and continued after grad- 
uation for every day that he is on duty. 

But the aim of the Naval War College 
is to lead him onward and upward, that he 
may grasp the full meaning of the problem 
how to bring many ships together into the 
squadron, or the fleet, and then how to deal 
with them thus combined and unified. 

Who can say of this or that young officer 
that he may not on some bright morning in 
the future meet the crucial moment of his 
life at the head of a line of battleships? He 
who wears the uniform must in all serious- 
ness ask himself, "What am I to do if I 
have a campaign to plan, a victory to gain ? " 
There is but one answer: "I must consult 
the past. I must gain ready knowledge of 
what the great sailors of history have done. 
I must look with clear vision into the prin- 
ciples upon which they went forward to the 
honor and glory of their country." 

Such is the lofty theme to which you here 
would dedicate the thoughts of your noble 
profession. Nor is it too much to hope of 
those who resort hither that each in turn 



16 DECK AND FIELD 

will find himself inspired with the determi- 
nation to walk "Along the far Eastern up- 
lands, meditating and remembering." 

Therefore it is that we bid a hearty God- 
speed to your work. Mr. President, may 
you, and those associated with you, sir, 
enjoy the rich reward of seeing that work 
fruitful of the best results to the service and 
to the country. 



II 

NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 
1901 



II 



ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE 
NAVAL WAR COLLEGE 

NEWPORT RHODE ISLAND JUNE 3 1901 

[The exercises at the opening of the War College, 
this season, excited more than usual interest. The at- 
tendance of officers of the Navy and of the Army was 
very large, while there were not a few men present 
of prominence in civil life. Many ladies were of the 
audience. The flagship Kearsarge, together with other 
ships of the North Atlantic Squadron, lay at anchor in 
the harbor. The Assistant Secretary had arrived from 
Washington on board the U. S. S. Dolphin. 

It was a lovely June day, and Newport had made 
the occasion one of social pleasure. After the delivery 
of the address, a reception and lunch was enjoyed 
at the house of the President of the College, Captain 
French Ensor Chadwick, U. S. N. 

In introducing the speaker, Captain Chadwick 
said : — 

"The College is fortunate and honored to-day in 
having here to say the opening words for the summer 
course the Assistant Secretary of the Navy. I trust 
that he will permit me to say that we feel peculiarly 
grateful for his coming when under demands of duty 
which make it extremely difficult for him to be absent 
from Washington at all. It is an indication, though no 



20 DECK AND FIELD 

proof was needed, of his deep interest in the College 
and its work. 

"The Commander-in-Chief of the North Atlantic 
Squadron 1 has also shown his regard for the College 
by hurrying forward the repairs to his flagship and 
being present with his staff and officers. 

" And we are honored, too, by the presence of one 
whom all the Navy holds in deepest regard and affec- 
tion, our Commander-in-Chief at Santiago. 2 

" It is with pleasure I present to you the Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy."] 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the 
War College : — 
A year ago the honor and pleasure were 
mine of coming here, as a messenger, bring- 
ing to you the hearty greetings of the Navy 
Department. To-day I am the bearer of like 
good cheer. I trust that, in order to be re- 
garded as in some sense an old friend, I need 
not be driven to the expedient of reminding 
you that during the interval we have stepped 
from one century into another. At all events, 
I can assure you that the Secretary of the 
Navy and those associated with him note 
with increasing satisfaction all that your 
faithful labor is accomplishing at the War 
College. 

1 Rear Admiral Higginson. 2 Rear Admiral Sampson. 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 21 

The enterprise is now well beyond the 
stage of experiment. Its friends can have 
no fears for the future. 

Seventeen years have passed since the 
first steps were taken to bring into being 
an institution that should provide for the 
" higher education " of officers of the Navy. 
During its early struggle for existence the 
Naval War College met and dissipated that 
cloud of prejudices which is almost sure to 
envelop a project in its nature novel and 
experimental. The College has survived for 
the reason that faith has been kept with the 
promises of those who stood as its sponsors. 

Already how excellent is the record. How 
clearly do we now see that the work done 
within these walls lifts the officer into a 
higher atmosphere, broadens his concep- 
tions, and brings him distinctly nearer to 
that ideal standard of development which it 
has ever been the aspiration of the Ameri- 
can Navy to attain. 

The hour and the place are propitious 
for an expression of grateful acknowledg- 
ment to the accomplished officer and gentle- 
man to whom belongs the honored title of 
the founder of the Naval War College. His 



22 DECK AND FIELD 

long and busy career has been characterized 
at every step by an ardent desire to improve 
and elevate the profession which he so con- 
spicuously adorns. In the exercise of a fore- 
sight of the highest order, this true type of 
an American sailor " turned to " (if I may 
borrow Jack's handy phrase) and brought 
to bear upon those in authority such force 
of argument, and such well-directed energy, 
that Congress enacted the desired legislation 
and gave to the country a Naval War Col- 
lege, the first institution of the kind that the 
world has ever known. 

It was the dawn of a new era for the Navy. 

To our good friend likewise is credit due 
that the institution was established where it 
should be — here in this historic harbor, a 
locality as affluent of advantage as it is of 
delights. 

To the founder and constant helper of 
the War College, Rear Admiral Stephen 
Bleecker Luce, we extend a tribute of praise 
and sincere thanks. We persuade ourselves 
that Time likes to deal gently with him, so 
that the War College may still look for 
counsel to its Nestor during many a year 
to come. 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 23 

What the College is, what its aims and 
purposes, and to what extent it may claim 
to have answered the hopes of those who 
from the first have believed in it, is to be 
taken, I assume, as fairly well known to all, 
from cadet to admiral. 

But it is not alone officers of the Navy 
who are watching with interest what you do 
here. That our ships, with their complement 
of officers and men, shall be kept always at 
the highest point of efficiency, ready upon 
the instant for war, is an object of concern 
to every citizen in the land. 

We need not apprehend that the day shall 
come when an American, whether living 
on the coast or far inland, is indifferent to 
the status of his Navy. The people are alive 
to what you are doing here. They are well 
aware how much of protection and security 
your work signifies to them. They recognize 
the fact that it is for them that the War Col- 
lege opens its doors to annual classes ; for 
them that the trained mind is still further 
disciplined, made more alert, more resource- 
ful, more familiar with the conditions and 
problems of actual war. 

Since the development of our naval 



24 DECK AND FIELD 

strength must rely upon the influences of 
an enlightened public opinion, we welcome 
the opportunity afforded by the annual open- 
ing of the course thus to remind the country 
at large of the results here attained. 

The fact that the people, one and all, 
look upon their Navy with affection is to 
be attributed to something more than senti- 
ment. To be sure, the sea and what is done 
upon it has in every age laid a spell upon 
the imagination of man. Allow for this sub- 
tile agency — there yet remains on all sides 
a conviction that American valor and prow- 
ess on the ocean is racial in origin; that 
it is to be counted on as a natural outcome 
of free institutions such as ours. The sup- 
port ungrudgingly given by the country to 
its naval establishment furnishes to every 
officer and to every enlisted man an incen- 
tive to do his utmost to make the service 
worthy of public confidence and pride. 

But how is an officer to do his utmost ? 
To ask the question is to bring us to the 
consideration of what is submitted as the 
leading thought of this address, namely, that 
every officer of the Navy for the period of 
his active service should undergo a contin- 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 25 

uing process of education and training — 
not partial and fitful, but without remission. 

Were you at this moment to confront 
me with the query, What ought an officer 
of the United States Navy to be? I should 
refer you to the text of a letter penned by 
as great a man as ever sailed under any flag, 
John Paul Jones. It bears date September 
14, 1775, and is addressed to Mr. Hewes, of 
the Provisional Marine Committee of the 
Continental Congress. Read this remark- 
able letter, and you are advised of precisely 
those qualifications that a naval officer should 
possess. Its concise, direct terms are for all 
time. The description stands forth just as 
apt and as sufficient at this hour as it was 
when the author wrote it. 

Let me add, in passing, that readers of 
the recently published " Life of John Paul 
Jones," by Mr. Buell, cannot too warmly 
thank that writer for his industry in bringing 
to light new material, and his skill in reveal- 
ing to us the grand proportions of the man 
of whom he writes. 1 Hitherto the world had 

1 Since these words were uttered, the fact has been re- 
vealed that John Paul Jones did not write the remarkable 
letter of September 14, 1775. Most of the views contained 



26 DECK AND FIELD 

known Paul Jones simply and exclusively 
as a sea fighter, the foremost of any age. 
We now, and most of us for the first time, 
see in him a statesman, a diplomat of rare 
ability, and an accomplished man of the 
world. At last an adequate conception of 
our hero being thus presented to his country- 
men, it would be an act of tardy justice to 
set up at Washington a memorial of John 
Paul Jones, where as yet none exists. Surely 
his statue deserves to occupy a place of 
honor at the Navy Department. 

Much in the same way, were reasons to be 
demanded of me for maintaining the Naval 
War College, I should bid the questioner 
turn to the report of a board appointed by 
Secretary Chandler, May 3, 1884, to deal 
with the subject. This document, which is 
to be found in the Report of the Secretary 
of the Navy for 1885, * s signed by Com- 
modore S. B. Luce, Commander W. T. 
Sampson, and Lieutenant-Commander C. 
F. Goodrich. The board did their work 

in this letter, as given by Buell, appear, however, to have 
been expressed by Jones, at later dates, in sundry writings. 
It is with a profound regret that we are obliged to discredit 
much of the "new material" which this entertaining bio- 
grapher has assumed to bring forward. See Appendix II. 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 27 

well. Their report sets forth the need of an 
institution such as this, and briefly outlines 
the scope of what it might hope to compass. 
The thought occurs that you may do worse 
than to put a copy of this instructive paper 
into the hands of each newcomer upon his 
reporting here for duty. 

Here one finds a school where facilities 
are offered for that broader training which 
is demanded of those having in charge our 
modern ships of war. In days gone by, it 
used to be taken for granted that the at- 
tainment of high rank meant that the cul- 
minating point of skill and efficiency had 
been reached. They were indeed grand old 
sailors. Masters of seamanship, they dis- 
played a tact in the handling of men that 
was the perfection of discipline. They en- 
joyed, all of them, an extensive acquaintance 
with foreign countries, and knew something 
of their own, along the seaboard. Their 
varied experience afloat and ashore (includ- 
ing a list of supposed hardships which they 
went through as youngsters) brightened their 
faculties, and created the type of the Ameri- 
can naval officer, able, accomplished, always 
brave, such as no country in the world has 



28 DECK AND FIELD 

surpassed. All honor to the memory of those 
gallant men. 

But the day of those men is not our day. 
Alike in business, in professional life, in 
affairs of state, or in the art of war, a spirit 
of change has done its work, and much once 
thought indispensable has now been dis- 
carded as outgrown. Could Paul Jones, or 
Truxtun, or Perry, or Decatur, come back 
to life and set foot upon one of our armored 
battleships, he would indeed be lost in won- 
der. Boundless would be his surprise at 
learning to what extent the faculties and at- 
tainments of a commanding officer are taxed 
to answer the demands of his position. We 
are safe in saying of the naval officer of the 
present period that he must know more 
things, and know them accurately, too, than 
were ever demanded of him who trod the 
quarter-deck half a century ago. New prob- 
lems present themselves for solution, and 
some of the graver ones you deal with here 
at the War College. 

As for education in general, I confess there 
is a strong temptation to discourse upon so 
attractive a topic. It has always been the 
fashion, and probably it always will be, to 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 29 

talk more or less eruditely about education. 
Now and then some individual of exemplary 
patience tries to fathom the subject, but we 
seldom hear that he meets with any great 
success. 

As early as 1644, J onn Milton had com- 
posed his brief Tractate, condemning the 
methods of education then in vogue at the 
universities. But the production, with all the 
author's learning, offered scarcely a sugges- 
tion that was of practical use ; though, hap- 
pily, it has enriched literature by the noblest 
definition of education that can be conceived : 
" I call a complete and generous education 
that which fits a man to perform justly, skill- 
fully, and magnanimously all the offices, both 
public and private, of peace and war." 

John Locke, in his "Thoughts Concerning 
Education," gave much excellent advice that 
some of our colonial ancestors might well 
have thanked him for. About a century later, 
Pestalozzi advanced a plausible theory or two 
that brought him numerous followers ; while 
Lancaster, long afterwards, undertook to tell 
our grandfathers how to manage their chil- 
dren. Of living writers, an essay of Herbert 
Spencer yields food for profitable reflection. 



3o DECK AND FIELD 

After the printing of so many books, and 
after so much discussion, one might imagine 
that the leading principles of education would 
be found substantially reduced to a science. 
Not at all. Parents and guardians are going 
ahead timidly now, much as they did in former 
times ; while the average boy or girl remains 
as much of a puzzle as ever. For a while we 
try new methods, and then set them aside 
for others. They in turn have to give place 
to something else that allures with a promise. 
Still, out from all this partial success and 
failure there has come a residuum not with- 
out value. The schoolmaster manages some- 
how to keep a little in advance of his pupil, 
apparently reconciled to the prospect that, 
provided he live long enough, he is sure to 
be looked upon as old-fashioned. 

I venture to say that there may be some 
one present who, by an effort of memory, can 
recall a phrase once applied to young ladies 
at a boarding-school, or, as it was custom- 
ary to style it, "seminary." This phrase has 
dropped out of currency, but when it pre- 
vailed, people used to say of the young wo- 
man that she was engaged in "finishing her 
education." For myself, I chiefly remember 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 31 

the expression because of a reply attributed 
to Doctor Wayland, an educator of emi- 
nence in his day. It is related, I believe, of 
the Doctor that at the close of certain gradu- 
ating exercises a young lady came up to him 
and exclaimed: "Congratulate me, Doctor 
Wayland, for I have finished my education." 
" Have you, indeed, my child ?" said the good 
man, smiling ; " you are more fortunate than 
I, for I am just beginning mine." 

Now that we have a Naval War College, 
who would dream of saying of a captain, or 
of a rear admiral, that he has " finished his 
education " ? 

In prescribing a plan in the nature of a 
curriculum the College has kept in view one 
cardinal proposition : Success in war lies in 
preparation. A simple truth, so simple, in- 
deed, that you may call it commonplace, if 
you like. But a maxim may go unchallenged, 
and yet fail to impress itself upon the hearer 
at the moment he should be governed by it. 

Being ready signifies something beyond 
the ability to get your ships, guns, and men 
at the place you want them, the very hour 
you want them. It means the presence on 
board of a master mind, that knows how to 



32 DECK AND FIELD 

use this force to the highest advantage, the 
one man who can get out of it the greatest 
power wherewith to defeat and crush the 
enemy. A master mind does not find its way 
to supreme command haphazard. Training 
and hard thinking bring it about. To have 
such a captain close at hand — this is pre- 
paration ; this is what it is to be ready. 

Only let us be prepared, the world takes 
notice, and here we get one of the very few 
conditions upon which a government can 
rely for conserving peace. 

The Navy, a body of highly trained offi- 
cers, is, it cannot too earnestly be declared, 
sincere in hoping that a state of peace may 
long continue. It is doubtful if the service 
contains a single individual of the right 
spirit who does not stand ready to approve 
of any well-considered plan which promises 
to render the possibility of war more and 
more remote. 

You who enter upon the course now 
opening do so animated by a desire for 
peace. True, you but obey a natural instinct 
when you seek to perfect yourselves in the 
lesson of being ready. It is the first duty 
you owe to your profession and to the 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 33 

country. Still, you would have it understood 
that the moving impulse is that our naval 
strength be kept in such a state of instant 
efficiency that no power will hastily provoke 
war with the United States. 

The American people cherish good will 
toward all other powers, and value a like 
good will in return. But we perfectly com- 
prehend of what vital moment it is that 
every other power be impressed at all times 
with a wholesome dread of having the 
United States for an enemy. To this end, 
peace-loving as we are, we have announced 
it to be our settled policy to maintain a 
powerfully equipped Navy. 

The people mean that in ships and guns 
the United States shall hold its rightful 
position. They never will tolerate that our 
sea-going force fall into an inferior rank 
among the navies of the world. The largest 
measure of safety, they firmly believe, rests 
with that country whose naval authorities 
can put the better brain upon the bridge. 

Holding this high purpose in view, you 
assemble here that you may engage in the 
task of educating yourselves ; for this is a 
college without professor or text-book. All 



34 DECK AND FIELD 

are students. You are to learn something 
of naval tactics and naval strategy. You will 
listen to lectures upon naval history, upon 
international law, and like topics ; some of 
you will prepare and read papers dealing 
with naval campaigns ; you will point out 
and discuss the causes of success or failure 
attending naval operations of our own and 
of other powers. 

But the unique feature of the course is 
what is known as "the war game." Here 
one finds out empirically into what sort of 
a situation he is likely to be precipitated in 
the event that war shall suddenly come upon 
us. It sets a man to thinking what he had 
better do about it. When an officer goes away 
at the end of the course, he carries with him 
a new stock of ideas. Later, upon taking 
command of a ship, there would seem to 
be no reason why he may not improve the 
opportunity to impart some of these ideas 
to junior officers. In this way the influence 
of the Naval War College may be exerted 
in numerous directions. 

The sinking of Cervera's fleet was not the 
execution of a plan suddenly inspired. On 
the contrary, that memorable July forenoon 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 35 

saw wrought out that which, in its begin- 
ning at least, was rehearsed, so to speak, in 
these very halls. An incident that occurred 
not long after the close of the war serves to 
illustrate my meaning. Rear Admiral Samp- 
son, happening to be here, saw suspended 
on the wall a large chart of the Cuban coast. 
It bore certain marks that denoted the 
movements of war vessels. The Admiral 
took it to be a chart that had recently been 
prepared for the purpose of illustrating 
certain features of the Spanish War. It 
turned out, as a matter of fact, that he was 
looking at a working model that had been 
put to use two years before the war in the 
study of an imaginary campaign against 
Spain. 

So, too, the contingency of scouting in the 
West Indian waters during supposed hos- 
tilities with Spain had not been neglected. 
For the purpose two rooms were occupied. 
An officer in each room represented a con- 
tending force. Each started with a like 
knowledge of the number, character, and 
the assumed disposition of the ships of the 
other. Each did the best he could to fix the 
whereabouts of his opponent. On a signal 



36 DECK AND FIELD 

work was stopped and the officers compared 
results. It is told of one accomplished com- 
mander, whose ship did invaluable service as 
a scout on the Cuban coast, that while thus 
engaged he found the work strangely famil- 
iar, and said of it: " Why, it seems as though 
I am sure later on to hear Taylor's bell." 

Another illustration of the benefits of the 
instruction here will, I think, interest you. 
You will recall the fact that during the 
Spanish War Rear Admiral Remey served 
on board the Lancaster, a station-ship at 
Key West. The Admiral was the centre of 
communication between the Navy Depart- 
ment and our fleet in the West Indies. How 
well he performed that duty you need not 
be told. An officer of Admiral Remey's staff 
is quoted as having said of the work in the 
Admiral's office that it " was exactly like the 
work during one of the War College war 
games ; and that no study could have better 
fitted one for the real thing." 

Were nothing else to be gained from a 
season spent at the College, the participant 
in the game of war grows accustomed to 
approach a problem in manoeuvres or strat- 
egy with some degree of confidence. He 



NAVAL WAR COLLEGE ADDRESS 37 

gains here, as he could nowhere else, a 
familiarity with many of the conditions of 
actual conflict. In other words, an emer- 
gency does not overwhelm him with sur- 
prise. More than this, the experience affords 
him an insight into what nine times out of 
ten the enemy is likely to do. 

We may go a step farther and say that it 
is among the possibilities that some daring 
mind, kindled here with ambition to surpass 
his fellows, may one day conceive of an ori- 
ginal idea in naval tactics, the realization of 
which will give to his country a tremendous 
advantage. 

The United States, in enlarging its bor- 
ders and taking to itself foreign possessions, 
has indeed assumed a grave responsibility. 
To the Navy is largely due their acquisition. 
Upon the people of these distant islands 
we are conferring the blessings of good gov- 
ernment. For their protection and welfare 
we shall continue to look, in a large mea- 
sure, to the Navy. Nor shall we be disap- 
pointed. 

Never before in time of peace have there 
been held out to officers of the United 



38 DECK AND FIELD 

States Navy opportunities so inviting to do 
good and lasting service to their country. 

Let the standard of the Naval War Col- 
lege be maintained. Then, when war comes, 
and the people turn to their Navy, it will be 
with perfect confidence that its deeds shall 
deserve well of the Republic. 



Ill 

KEARSARGE — ALABAMA 



Ill 

ADDRESS AT PRESENTATION BY THE 
STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE OF THE 
KEARSARGE-ALABAMA TABLETS 

PORTSMOUTH NEW HAMPSHIRE 
SEPTEMBER 18 1900 

[The circumstance that two new battleships were 
named respectively the Kearsarge and the Alabama 
induced the State of New Hampshire to make it the 
occasion for testifying to the cordial good will existing 
between the North and South. The State offered to 
present a tablet to each battleship, — an offer that was 
gladly accepted by the Navy Department. 

Three days were assigned to celebrating at Ports- 
mouth the event of the presentation of the tablets. 
Governor Johnston of Alabama, with a large party, 
many of whom were ladies (one the daughter of Ad- 
miral Raphael Semmes, of Alabama fame), came to 
Portsmouth as guests of the State, as did ex-Secretary 
Herbert of Alabama. Secretary Long, with Rear Ad- 
miral Sampson, and other distinguished officers of the 
Navy were in attendance. Governor Rollins, on behalf 
of the State, made a speech of welcome, full of genu- 
ine feeling. A very extensive and brilliant military 
display attracted an immense crowd of people. The 
entire North Atlantic Squadron lay in Portsmouth 



42 DECK AND FIELD 

Harbor. The same kind of tablet was presented to 
each ship. At the base of the Kearsarge tablet were 
these words : — 

From the State of New Hampshire to the 

U. S. S. Kearsarge. 

To maintain justice, honor, freedom 

In the service of a reunited people. 

The inscription on the Alabama tablet read as fol- 
lows : — 

The State of New Hampshire to the U. S. S. Alabama. 
This tablet, companion to that of the U. S. S. Kearsarge, 
placed here by courtesy of the State of Alabama, perpet- 
uates in enduring peace names once joined in historic 
combat. 

Every form of hospitality was shown to the visitors 
from Alabama, including a trip through the White 
Mountains, — and all thoroughly enjoyed themselves. 

The celebration proved to be an unqualified suc- 
cess. If not the earliest, certainly it was the most con- 
spicuous, testimonial of the existence of the best of 
feeling between the people of the North and those 
of the South. The effect throughout the country, 
particularly at the South, was excellent. Many inter- 
changes of kind relations, manifested after the guests 
had returned to their Southern homes, between those 
who thus met from States widely separated in dis- 
tance, furnished an additional proof that the purpose 
of this demonstration had been happily achieved.] 

In the spring of 1623, a little band of hardy 
Englishmen landed almost within sight of 



KEARS ARGE — ALABAMA 43 

where we now are * and began the first set- 
tlement of New Hampshire. From that day 
to the present hour this region has begotten 
sturdy seafaring men, prompt to face hard- 
ship and danger, ready to fight on deck, or 
on land, for liberty and country. 

The exercises in which we are engaged 
find their most appropriate setting upon 
these waters and by these shores. For it was 
here at Great Island (now New Castle), then 
the humble capital of the province, that in 
1684 a minister of the gospel and leader of 
the people spurned the edict of a relentless 
colonial governor and welcomed prison-bars 
rather than violate conscience. 

On yonder point the flag flies over Fort 
Constitution. There, long before the Revo- 
lution, stood old Fort William and Mary. 
Its walls witnessed the first overt act of 
defiance, in any one of the colonies, to the 
tyranny of George the Third, — the seizure 
and carrying away of the King's powder, 
— a deed whose daring, whenever heard of, 
thrilled the patriot heart. 

1 It was at first intended that the presentation of the tab- 
let to the Kearsarge should take place on board that ship 
lying in the roads beyond Fort Constitution. Later, it was 
arranged to have the exercises in the city of Portsmouth. 



44 DECK AND FIELD 

Out from this harbor, in 1777, sailed John 
Paul Jones, commanding the newly-built 
Ranger, of eighteen six-pounders, to carry 
the terror of his name across the sea. 

Up river, at the Navy Yard, early in the 
struggle for the Union, was launched the 
Kearsarge, that with her crew, mustered 
largely from the country hereabout, went 
forth to add a new lustre to the stars and 
stripes. 

We are here to bestow, with impressive 
and glad ceremony, a Godspeed upon two 
battleships that shall rival each other in 
zeal for the protection of our common 
country. 

Small need is there of words to voice the 
supreme thought of the hour. A spirit of 
profound gratefulness it is that, in the pro- 
vidence of God, the Union of these States 
continues to be, as from the hour of its cre- 
ation it ever has been — indestructible. 

To the Navy what we do here this day is 
full of meaning. It emphasizes and extols 
the truth that Heaven sends her choicest 
blessings to him, no matter what his station 
in life, who does his duty. For officer and 
man alike, duty has ever been the watch- 



KEARS ARGE — ALABAMA 45 

word of the Navy of the United States. Its 
pathway is lighted all along with deeds of 
patience, skill, and valor. 

Be assured, my friends, that as in the 
past, so for the future, you shall find the 
American sailor instant to do with heart 
and soul all that the dear old flag can ask 
of him. 



IV 
FLAG DAY 



IV 



ADDRESS AT EXERCISES IN COMMEM- 
ORATION OF FLAG DAY AT NEW 
NATIONAL THEATRE 

WASHINGTON DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 
JUNE 14 1901 

There are so many pretty girls here to-night, 
with their attendants, that I am going to 
begin in the words of Brutus and say : " Coun- 
trymen and lovers." 

My friend, General Breckinridge, has just 
made a splendid speech ; and he is a very 
hard man to follow. I know him of old. He 
has a habit of beginning by telling an audi- 
ence that he is not a public speaker, and then 
he goes on until the beauty and the elo- 
quence of his remarks convince the audience 
that he possesses the real Breckinridge gift 
of oratory. 

I shall not detain you very long, because 
when a man speaks for the Navy of the 
United States he has an easy thing to do. 
The truth is, our Navy is so close to the 



5 o DECK AND FIELD 

hearts of the people that the very mention 
of the word calls out applause. 

You know that it is a cardinal rule for him 
who would speak in public that he should 
open by saying something that will please 
the audience — that will let him get into their 
favor, as it were. While sitting here, enjoy- 
ing the situation, I confess that I've been 
thinking how I could say something about 
my audience that would be sure to please 
them. 

I only wish that you could come up here 
yourselves, and see how well you look from 
the stage point of view. Not that I need 
praise you for your good looks, for they can 
be taken for granted with a Washington 
audience. I would have you realize not only 
that you present a splendid appearance, but 
that there are men of mark among you here 
to-night, who give this assemblage a pe- 
culiar distinction. 

For instance, here in front on my right 
sits a gentleman 1 of whom I can tell you 
something that I think will greatly surprise 
you. This gentleman, one of our most hon- 

1 The Honorable Alexander Burton Hagner, born in 
Washington, July 13, 1826. See Appendix III. 



FLAG DAY 51 

ored citizens, is a son of a man who was one 
of the most faithful officials of the Govern- 
ment at its beginning. Son, mind you I say, 
not grandson. When this gentleman's father 
was at work one day in his office at Phila- 
delphia at the Government's business, he 
turned around and saw standing beside him 
two men — one of those visitors was George 
Washington, the other, Alexander Hamilton. 

Yes, those days do not seem far off, when 
we can say that there is still living the son 
of a man who had the honor of serving under 
these two great Americans. 

Now, on the other side of the aisle, I see 
a gallant Admiral. 1 I can almost detect him 
in the act of blushing at my singling him 
out. He is here after a long service of fidel- 
ity and honor to his country. In his younger 
days he was a lieutenant who had charge of 
the boat that took Mason and Slidell from 
the Trent and carried them on board the 
San Jacinto under Captain Wilkes. So you 
see these two residents of the District whom 
I have picked out are very appropriately 
here to-night in honor of Flag Day. 

1 Rear Admiral James Augustin Greer, U. S. N. He died 
June 17, 1904. 



52 DECK AND FIELD 

There is no need of stirring you up to 
show reverence for the flag. A feeling of 
deep respect and devotion is ever present 
with you all. 

But it is my province, I presume, to point 
out in a word or two how the Navy is par- 
ticularly identified with the duty of uphold- 
ing the flag. It is the Navy that carries the 
flag over distant seas and displays its glori- 
ous folds in foreign ports. 

By a felicity that is remarkable, it hap- 
pened that the Resolution of Congress of 
June 14, 1777, which fixed forever the colors 
and form of the American flag, embraced 
in its text also these memorable words : "Re- 
solved, That Captain John Paul Jones be 
appointed to command the ship Ranger." 

What a glorious privilege it was for 
our great naval hero thus to be associated 
with the birth of the American flag. In- 
deed, Jones himself said that he wished no 
greater honor. " The flag and I," he said, 
" are twins." 

Nor has there ever been a gallant soul who 
by his deeds has invested the flag with a more 
splendid lustre than John Paul Jones. I can 
speak of him feelingly, because I have the 



FLAG DAY 53 

honor of being a native of the old seaport 
town where the Ranger was built. The as- 
sociations of Paul Jones with Portsmouth, 
New Hampshire, are among its most pre- 
cious traditions. 

It was the Ranger, you will remember, 
that sped across the Atlantic like a grey- 
hound, carrying the news of the surrender 
of Burgoyne, the flag of the United States 
streaming at her masthead, an omen of other 
victories yet to come. It was John Paul 
Jones, on the Ranger, you will remember, 
who sailed through the French fleet at Brest, 
in February of 1778, proudly displaying the 
American flag, and receiving the first salute 
ever paid to it by another nation. 

The flag that flew from the masthead of 
the Ranger on that eventful day had a his- 
tory. It was the gift of young ladies of Ports- 
mouth, who presented it to Captain John 
Paul Jones, on the 4th of July, 1777. They 
had made it with their own hands, using 
their silk dresses for the purpose. One of 
these girls gave her wedding-dress, she hav- 
ing been married only in the May preceding. 1 

You may be sure that the Captain valued 

1 A story later found to be without foundation. See page 
192, Appendix. 



54 DECK AND FIELD 

that flag as a priceless treasure. He took it 
with him on the Bon Homme Richard, and 
under it fought that magnificent battle — 
a battle wherein the victor had to leave his 
ship to sink while he took possession of the 
ship of his enemy, the Serapis, That silk flag 
of the Richard went down to an honored 
resting-place beneath the waves. 

Such is the spirit and such the deeds whose 
memory animates and inspires the naval offi- 
cer and sailor of to-day to do their full duty. 

Here let me say something that I trust 
will take lodgment in the minds of you who 
love the flag and revere the memory of heroes 
who have fought under it. The time has 
come when there should be here at Wash- 
ington a statue or some memorial of that 
great naval captain, John Paul Jones. I need 
say no more. His career stamps him not only 
as a wonderful sea fighter, but as one of the 
truly great men of the age. 

For this suggestion credit is due a gallant 
officer of the Navy, the late Rear Admiral 
Richard W. Meade, who was an ardent ad- 
mirer of John Paul Jones, of whose career 
he had made a special study. Meade, with 
characteristic energy, advocated the project 



FLAG DAY 55 

of erecting a statue in honor of the "Founder 
of the American Navy." He went so far as to 
point out the southwest corner of Lafayette 
Square, diagonally across from the Navy 
Department Building, as a most appropri- 
ate site. 

I shall be content, and indeed pleased, if 
any word of mine, here or elsewhere, can 
hasten the hour when this work is done and 
a suitable monument erected to the memory 
of John Paul Jones at Washington. 

Ships of the Navy, as I have said, fly the 
flag in foreign ports. I well remember, in 
that fateful year of '61 that witnessed the 
oncoming of the war for the Union, the de- 
livery of a great speech in the Senate by 
Seward. The most striking feature of that 
speech, as I recall it, was a reference to the 
flag displayed upon a naval vessel of the 
United States. Forty years have gone since 
I first read it, but within a day or two I have 
refreshed my memory by turning to this 
historic speech. I wish I could recite the 
passage for your benefit. The Senator pic- 
tured the arrival in some foreign port of a 
man-of-war with the flag of the United States 
floating as emblematical of freedom. It re- 



56 DECK AND FIELD 

ceives the salutes of the port. Men in author- 
ity do it reverence, and the people gaze upon 
it as a sign of the liberty they desire. It is 
a sublime spectacle. There are beheld the 
majesty and the glory of the United States 
of America. 

Suppose, the Senator continued, the Union 
were dissolved and at a later day some ship 
comes into that same port with a strange 
flag at her peak. "What is that?" is the 
inquiry. It is only the flag of one of the 
obscure republics of America — let it pass. 

This but faintly revives the thought and 
the expression of the eloquent speaker. I 
recall the illustration as a telling argument 
in behalf of the Union. Thank God, that 
Union exists to-day stronger and firmer, 
while the flag bears a yet deeper meaning, 
a grander significance than ever before. 

It is worth while to go abroad that you 
may experience the sensation of beholding 
the flag of your country in foreign waters. 
Then it is that you fully realize what that 
flag means to you — and to mankind. 

I remember, too, when a boy, how the 
hammers in the shipyards of my native town 
made merry music. That was the period of 



FLAG DAY 57 

fast-sailing clippers, when the sails of Ameri- 
can commerce whitened every sea, and our 
merchant marine was fast laying hold upon 
the carrying trade of the world. Those were 
inspiring days in seaboard towns. May they 
come again; may our statesmen work to- 
gether to build up our merchant shipping, 
so that once again the American flag shall 
traverse every ocean, and be seen in every 
corner of the globe. 

Hand in hand with the growth of our 
merchant marine shall our Navy increase in 
strength and in the number of its ships. All 
this shall make for peace, but new duties 
have come upon this people, and they will 
be met. 

Your Navy of the future, like that of the 
past, will uphold the honor and dignity of 
the flag; and when the needful hour shall 
come, it will win new victories for the glory 
and the safety of the Republic. 



V 
FOURTH OF JULY 



ADDRESS AT THE BASE OF THE 
WASHINGTON MONUMENT IN CELE- 
BRATION OF THE ANNIVERSARY OF 
NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE DAY 

UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE DISTRICT 
OF COLUMBIA SOCIETY OF THE SONS OF 
THE REVOLUTION JULY 4 1893 

Here, within the grateful shade of this 
towering shaft, that silently lifts the thoughts 
of each of us heavenward, — this shaft that 
typifies alike the simplicity, the grandeur, 
and the shining purity of the character of 
him whose name to-day rises first to our 
lips, as in our hearts he is always first ; in a 
city destined, we trust, to carry to posterity 
his revered name, linked to all that is gra- 
cious and ennobling in the arts of civiliza- 
tion; here, on the banks of this fair river that 
not far hence flows with peaceful current by 
the gentle heights of Mount Vernon; here, 
in sight of yonder archives where repose 
the originals of the draft, and of the per- 



62 DECK AND FIELD 

fected instrument itself, whose approval by 
the Continental Congress, on the 4th of July, 
1776, marked a new epoch in the history 
of man ; here, at the capital of the nation, 
where distinction of state or section ceases, 
and we meet as citizens of a common coun- 
try, — upon what more inspiring spot may 
an American vent his joy at this returning 
anniversary of the nation's birth ? 

A body politic governing itself with a 
steadfast self-restraint, under a wholesome 
and orderly procedure, free from the gusts 
of passion, presents — and it must ever pre- 
sent — a sublime spectacle. When such a 
commonwealth is beheld, in numbers over 
sixty millions of souls, converting into happy 
homes a vast domain that sweeps from ocean 
to ocean, — a population busy, energetic, and 
highly prosperous, — the world well may 
marvel at the sight. 

Over every town and hamlet floats the 
flag of the Union. To-day at the World's 
Fair, congregated thousands raise the an- 
them, while in all our borders there resound 
the echoes of grateful praise that we are 
by the blessing of God one people ! 

American Independence! The theme, sir, 



FOURTH OF JULY 63 

never grows old. Each generation, as it 
comes forward to assume the responsibilities 
of citizenship, shall turn to that period when 
our ^ountry was small and feeble, but her 
& turdy and heroic, and shall heed with 

whcv solve the Signers of the Declaration 
stood tu ' the rights of man, the world over. 

No human achievement is worth com- 
memorating that has not behind it an idea. 

" The rights of man." This is the keynote 
of the gladness with which the land to-day 
exults. 

Historical writers there are who, going 
back even to so remote a date as 1635, affect 
to see in the vigorous resistance of Massa- 
chusetts Bay to the attack thus early threat- 
ened by the Crown against her charter, the 
first faint streaks of the dawn of the Ameri- 
can Revolution. 

When, in 1 761, James Otis had argued 
before the scarlet-robed judges, in the Coun- 
cil Chamber at Boston, in words of burning 
eloquence, against " writs of assistance," 
John Adams was led to exclaim: "Then 
and there was born American Independ- 
ence." Four years later, the voice of Patrick 
Henry, in the House of Burgesses of Vir- 



64 DECK AND FIELD 

ginia, denouncing the Stamp Act, sent a 
thrill to the heart of every lover of liberty. 
Already had Samuel Adams, far in the lead, 
ardently besought his countrymen to follow 
in the path of independence. 

On the 15th of May, 1776, the Congress, 
at Philadelphia, adopted a resolution, re- 
commending to the colonies to form inde- 
pendent governments. Only four had acted 
on the question of independence. North 
Carolina had come out for it. Virginia had 
instructed her delegates to propose that the 
Congress should declare for independence. 
Rhode Island had announced her willing- 
ness to join in any measure to secure Ameri- 
can rights ; while the Massachusetts towns 
had pledged themselves to maintain what- 
ever declaration the Congress might agree 
upon. But there was a strong party, we 
must remember, throughout the colonies 
that looked with extreme disfavor (not to 
say abhorrence) upon so radical a measure 
as separation from the mother country. 

Blood had indeed been shed at Lexing- 
ton and at Concord. The militia wore the 
honors of Bunker Hill. Washington, at the 
head of the Continental Army, had com- 



FOURTH OF JULY 65 

pelled the British troops to evacuate Boston. 
An attack upon Quebec had failed, but 
minor successes had been gained in Vir- 
ginia and the Carolinas. It was a period of 
actual hostilities, but the colonists had drawn 
the sword for the redress of grievances as 
British subjects. The flag of thirteen stripes 
still bore the cross of St. George. The future 
was dark with doubt. 

On the 7th of June, Richard Henry Lee, 
of Virginia, submitted a motion in the Con- 
gress that these United Colonies are, and 
of right ought to be, free and independent 
states; that they are absolved from all alle- 
giance to the British Crown; and that all 
political connection between them and the 
state of Britain is, and ought to be, totally 
dissolved. 

John Adams, of Massachusetts, ever fore- 
most in debate, seconded the motion. Able 
men opposed it, — Dickinson and Wilson, 
of Pennsylvania; Livingston, of New York; 
and Rutledge, of South Carolina. With a 
view to unanimity postponement was agreed 
to, but on condition that meanwhile a 
committee be chosen by ballot to draw up 
a declaration. The choice fell upon Jeffer- 



66 DECK AND FIELD 

son, Adams, Franklin, Sherman, and Liv- 
ingston. 

The motion was passed on the 2d of July, 
by the vote of twelve colonies. 

To Thomas Jefferson belongs the honor 
of drafting the declaration. As Mr. Web- 
ster, with even more than his usual felicity, 
phrases it: "All Americans may well rejoice 
that the work of drawing the title-deed of 
their liberties devolved upon him." 

On the 3d of July, Congress went into 
a committee of the whole to consider the 
text of the declaration. On the evening of 
Thursday, the 4th, the committee rose, 
and reported it, only slightly changed from 
the original draft. With one voice it was 
adopted. 

" The greatest question was decided 
which was ever debated in America, and a 
greater perhaps never was nor will be de- 
cided among men." Such were the pregnant 
words of John Adams. 

The Liberty Bell rang out the tidings 
from the top of the State House, and couriers 
carried the news to north and south as fast 
as horse could speed. The roll of drums, and 
the roar of cannon, the rocking of steeples, 



FOURTH OF JULY 67 

and at night the blaze of bonfires, proclaimed 
to the world that the United States of Amer- 
ica had taken rank in the family of nations. 
By the wisdom of statesmen at home 
and abroad, by the consummate skill and 
prudence of Washington, by the valor and 
endurance of officers and men of the army, 
by the fortitude of the people, and with the 
timely aid of the French King, our liberties 
were at last secured. 

And here, Mr. President, let me address 
a single word to the members of the Socie- 
ties of the Revolution, under whose encour- 
agement the present exercises are held. 

Your object, gentlemen, is worthy of all 
praise. Calling together those in whose veins 
runs the blood of a revolutionary ancestry 
you seek by fraternal endeavor to keep vividly 
before the people of these United States a 
sense of their obligation to the patriots of 
1776. In so doing you strengthen and help 
to perpetuate a genuine American senti- 
ment. 

Honored as I have been with the privilege 
of directing for a brief moment the thoughts 
of this assemblage to the scenes of the 
Revolution, I feel, sir, that it would be a 



68 DECK AND FIELD 

departure from the proprieties of the occa- 
sion were I to draw lessons from the record 
of that eventful period, and proceed to apply 
them to problems of the present hour. And 
yet, if there be pressing upon your attention 
subjects of public concern, whose treatment 
and final disposition demand of you some- 
what of the patriotic devotion that your 
fathers so freely displayed in the struggle 
for independence, it may not be out of place 
for your speaker, in drawing to a close these 
imperfect remarks, to bestow upon such 
topics at least a passing allusion. 

Democracy — the government of the 
people by the people — went upon trial in 
1776. Each year adds to the stock of confi- 
dence with which we may count upon its 
stability. But let us not forget, my friends, 
that democracy is still on trial, that new 
conditions arise from time to time with 
which it must deal adequately and wisely. 

Two dangers, it is plain to see, are at this 
very hour threatening us. 

I do not refer to clouds gathering on the 
horizon of business. These, we may believe, 
are soon to pass away under a prudent ad- 
ministration of affairs, which our honored 



FOURTH OF JULY 69 

Chief Magistrate, aided by conservative 
counselors irrespective of party, will give to 
the country. 

No: I mean first, foreign immigration, 
taken in connection with the growing tend- 
ency of our population to crowd into the 
cities ; and second, the portentous difficul- 
ties of dealing with the question of suffrage, 
so as to leave the ultimate source of power 
where only it belongs ; to secure a free ex- 
pression of opinion at the polls ; and to in- 
sure, in reaching and announcing the results 
of an election, the highest degree of fairness 
that the imperfections of human nature will 
permit. 

These are living questions. They cannot 
be evaded. They must be met and solved. 
To solve them aright is to tax to the utmost 
the wisdom, the moderation, and the unself- 
ishness of those who take part in public 
affairs. 

But let us indulge in no fears. Rather let 
us set about the work (each as best he may) 
of creating in this regard a sound public 
sentiment. In other words, let us do our 
whole duty as citizens. Above all, let us 
prove ourselves to be Americans through 



7o DECK AND FIELD 

and through, resting our faith for the future 
of the Republic upon that comfortable as- 
surance—the guiding motto of one of the 
old thirteen — Qui transtulit, sustinet: 
" He who has brought us thus far, will yet 
sustain us ! " 



VI 

DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT 



VI 



ADDRESS AT THE UNVEILING OF A 
TABLET IN MEMORY OF ADMIRAL 
DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT, U. S.N. 

AT THE NAVY YARD PORTSMOUTH NEW 
HAMPSHIRE AUGUST 26 1908 

[It was a most becoming act to mark at the Ports- 
mouth Navy Yard the site of the house in which Ad- 
miral Farragut died. The Yard at the time of that event 
was under the command of Rear Admiral Alexander 
Mosely Pennock, U. S. N. Mrs. Pen nock and Mrs. 
Farragut were first cousins, being of the Loyall family 
of Norfolk, Virginia. Admiral Farragut had resorted 
to the Portsmouth Yard, in the hope that a change of 
climate would benefit his health. 

It was most appropriate, too, that Admiral Dewey 
should unveil the tablet. The exercises, pleasing for 
their very simplicity, took place on the afternoon of 
Wednesday, August 26, 1908, in the presence of a 
large company, among whom was Loyall Farragut, 
son of the Admiral. A few men who had served under 
Farragut were seated near the tablet, as were repre- 
sentatives of the Grand Army of the Republic. Officers 
of the Navy with their families had been invited, and 
the hour had been selected so as to permit the work- 
men of the Navy Yard to be present. 

Admiral Dewey, accompanied by Mrs. Dewey, had 



74 DECK AND FIELD 

arrived in the U. S. S. Dolphin. The full Marine 
guard and band were drawn up in line in front of the 
house of the Commandant. The house stands on an 
eminence, with a lawn sloping down to the street. 
After the Admiral had returned to the Marine Guard 
their salute, he started to walk up the pathway to 
the house, accompanied by a large group of officers 
in full dress. The sight of the Admiral and his com- 
panions, coming up, as viewed from the piazza of the 
house, was impressive. 

The flag which covered the tablet had been used 
on the Tallapoosa upon the last trip taken by Admiral 
Farragut. On the other side of the doorway from the 
tablet was a fine portrait of Admiral Farragut. 

The tablet is of a handsome design, simple, and of 
a superior workmanship. The inscription reads : — 

Died in this house, August 14, 1870, 

David Glasgow Farragut, 

Admiral United States Navy : 

Faithful and Fearless. 

In Appendix IV the reader will find the text of 
the prayer offered by Chaplain Thompson, remarks 
of Admiral Dewey, and a very interesting and valu- 
able letter from Rear Admiral John Crittenden Wat- 
son, U. S. N., giving some reminiscences of Admiral 
Farragut, with whom he had served as a staff officer. 
It was greatly regretted that Rear Admiral Watson 
could not be present in person. His letter was read 
by Captain Edwin King Moore, U. S. N., Commandant 
of the Yard, who had made the arrangements for the 
exercises, and who carried them out with excellent 
taste.l 



DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT 75 

Fortunate Farragut! Fortunate in that 
you did so much to save the Union. Truly 
yours was 

... a full and splendid life, and laurelled rest at the goal. 

With what skill, with what daring, with 
what inflexibility of purpose, into the thick 
of perils, seen and unseen, you led the way 
and triumphed ! 

When the close of life drew near, you 
were fortunate in the site ordained for meet- 
ing the dread enemy. Not for you was it, 
like England's captain, stricken to the deck, 
to expire amid the roar of guns and the 
shouts of victory. No, not on shipboard, but 
at this beautiful spot, — a home for the Navy, 
— almost within sound of ocean's surge, 
you, with tranquil mind and in perfect com- 
posure of spirit, entered upon the life eternal. 

Here for all time the great admiral has 
fixed a shrine. How fit a place for putting 
off the armor — a place full of associations 
to warm a sailor's heart! 

The banks of this river as early as 1695 
had witnessed the building of ships-of-war 
for the King's service. The Revolution 
found the Pascataqua admirably suited to 



76 DECK AND FIELD 

the work of installing the beginning of an 
American navy. In 1776, the Raleigh, of 
thirty-two guns, was built. A little later, 
from Langdon's Island, close by us here, the 
Ranger was launched. John Paul Jones 
took her, with a hardy crew drawn from 
this neighborhood, and sped over to the 
English Channel, there to make history 
with her. On the same island they built a 
ship-of-the-line (ordered by the Continental 
Congress), the America, a marvel of her 
day, whose fate it was to be given to our 
ally, France. 

When the naval war of 18 12 was upon 
us, there came to command this station an 
officer freshly crowned with honors, the 
victor of the Constitution — Isaac Hull. 

Here, at an early period of the struggle 
for the Union, a ship was built under pres- 
sure of haste, yet deftly and strongly, — 
the Kearsarge. It seems but yesterday that 
your speaker stood upon her deck while she 
gracefully slid down the ways. She, too, was 
heard of in the English Channel. 

Of further associations that must have 
inspired the hero of the lower Mississippi 
and of Mobile Bay with a degree of affec- 



DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT 77 

tion for this historic Yard, a single instance 
may be mentioned of touching significance. 

Among the commanders who fought their 
ships under the eye of their intrepid flag- 
officer, there was one whose name is linked 
with that of Farragut in a sad yet glorious 
distinction; an officer who was born here, 
where we now are met, who was christened 
in the church (St. John's) from which the 
Admiral was buried. 

In the Mobile attack, Farragut from the 
flagship could see the ironclad ^ecumseh 
taking a short cut over a line set with tor- 
pedoes. Suddenly, torn open by a torpedo, 
she was settling down to take her final 
plunge. Her captain and pilot (you recall 
the incident) reached the foot of the ladder 
at the same instant. The officer stepped to 
one side and motioned to the other to mount. 
The pilot escaped. Craven went down with 
his ship, as did many another gallant soul 
that day. 

It is worthy of remembrance that Admiral 
Farragut should have breathed his last here 
upon the spot where Tunis Augustus Mac- 
donough Craven was born. 

Of those who served under Farraeut in 



7 8 DECK AND FIELD 

the Gulf few now survive. An officer or two, 
and a handful of men, are here to testify of 
their love for their old commander. To you, 
and to each of you, we pay the homage of 
our deep gratitude for the service you so 
nobly rendered. 

How can I express the satisfaction we 
feel at the presence of the writer of the feli- 
citous words upon this tablet, " Faithful and 
fearless" — the Admiral of the Navy — the 
illustrious Dewey ! 

In your career, sir, we see a monument to 
the genius of your great predecessor. The 
youth has bent the bow of Ulysses. Apt 
pupil of a consummate master! 

We cannot give too much praise to the suc- 
cessful naval commander. He has earned 
our lasting gratitude for what he has accom- 
plished. He has reached his rank, we must 
remember, only after years of disciplinary 
self-command, of arduous toil, step by step 
upward. Indiscriminate and extravagant 
words of eulogy may, it is true, fall from 
lips that speak after but little reflection. But 
the more closely we study the nature of the 
qualities that are needed to insure success 
in the highest command, the more abun- 



DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT 79 

dantly will our hearts respond in terms of 
admiration for the deeds of the great leader, 
whether on sea or land. 

A battle, let us remind ourselves, is an in- 
tellectual struggle — the opposing of two 
minds in play at high tension. He to whom 
supreme command has been intrusted is 
putting his wits against those of his antag- 
onist. Each is trying to solve a problem; 
each has to think it all out for himself. One 
man's will-power animates the mass. Men 
learn quickly enough of what sort of stuff 
the commander-in-chief is made. There is 
small likelihood of going astray when we 
would estimate the importance of the admi- 
ral, or the general, in bringing about results. 

Farragut possessed to a remarkable de- 
gree all these requisite qualities. He saw 
clearly, reasoned soundly, acted promptly. 
Nature had been generous to him, and a 
course of training, early begun, had devel- 
oped his powers in the right direction. He 
was at once aggressive and prudent. He had 
a keen sense of opportunity offered ; and his 
self-reliance enabled him to seize that mo- 
ment of opportunity and make the most of it. 
He displayed, moreover, that essential ele- 



80 DECK AND FIELD 

merit of successful leadership — a capacity to 
impart to others the impetus of his own dash 
and enthusiasm, seasoned with confidence 
in the wisdom of the move he was making. 

In brief, the nearer you approach this 
great captain, the more does he impress you 
as having been cut out expressly for the task 
that President Lincoln bade him undertake. 

Let me add a word to declare my profound 
conviction that the officers of our Navy at 
the present moment are upholding a stand- 
ard of professional excellence of which this 
country cannot be too proud. They consti- 
tute a body of highly educated gentlemen, 
who, for proficiency in the art of naval war- 
fare, for good judgment, for force, and for 
moral courage, are not surpassed by the offi- 
cers of any other naval service, nor indeed 
by officers of our own Navy of any former 
period. This estimate is advanced as the 
fruit of long observation on the part of one 
who has not been without a vantage-ground 
to look from. 

This tablet is going to inspire many a 
young man who shall see it in days to come, 
telling him of a public servant who marked 



DAVID GLASGOW FARRAGUT 81 

out for himself a line of duty, and in its faith- 
ful and fearless performance brought safety 
and glory to his country. 

The Admiral was of the old Navy — a 
thoroughgoing sailor. He had captains upon 
whom he could rely — splendid officers ; but 
alike in the conception and in the execution 
of the plan, his was the master mind. He 
earned his laurels fairly. He wore them mod- 
estly. The American people will hold in 
everlasting honor the name of David Glas- 
gow Farragut. 



VII 
RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 



VII 

ADDRESS AT THE UNVEILING OF A 
TABLET IN MEMORY OF REAR AD- 
MIRAL RICHARD WORSAM MEADE, 
U. S. N., AT THE NAVAL ACADEMY 

ANNAPOLIS MARYLAND MAY 30 1901 

[The unveiling of the tablet in memory of Rear Ad- 
miral Richard Worsam Meade, U. S. N., occurred on 
a beautiful May day, at a time when the grounds of 
the Naval Academy looked most lovely, The exercises 
were in charge of Commander Richard Wainwright, 
U. S. N., Superintendent of the Academy. Com- 
mander Allan C. Blakewell of Lafayette Post, New 
York City, with appropriate remarks, presented the 
tablet to the Naval Academy. The gift was accepted 
by Commander Wainwright. The tablet bears a finely 
executed medallion head of the late Rear Admiral; 
and the inscription recites the various grades which 
he had attained in the service, with the date of each 
promotion. 

The following description of the exercises is quoted 
from the "Army and Navy Register," Washington, 
June 1, 1901 : — 

Impressive and beautiful exercises were held May 30 in 
the chapel of the Naval Academy at Annapolis, when a 
memorial tablet to the late Admiral Richard Worsam 
Meade was installed. The memorial was the gift of La- 



86 DECK AND FIELD 

fayette Post No. 40, Department of New York, G. A. R., 
of which the late admiral was commander at the time of 
his death in May, 1897, and about one hundred and fifty 
members of the post came on a special train from New 
York to be present at the services. A party went from this 
city, including Mr. Frank W. Hackett, Assistant Secretary 
of the Navy ; Rear Admiral W. K. Van Reypen, Rear Ad- 
miral R. B. Bradford, Captain Samuel C. Lemly, Captain 
Theo. F. Jewell, U. S. Navy, and wife ; Captain Charles 
D. Sigsbee, U. S. Navy, and wife ; General A. E. Bates, 
General A. R. Bufnngton, General Joseph C. Breckinridge, 
Major Frank A. Butts and wife, Captain Gideon A. Lyon, 
Lieutenant James Edwin Browne, Captain George H. Pat- 
rick, Colonel Watson W. Eldridge, and Major John S. 
Loud, U. S. Army.] 

Commander and Comrades of Lafayette 
Post: — 

After this beautiful and touching cere- 
mony, whose meaning I am sure has come 
near to every heart, it would seem almost as 
though no further word can be either appro- 
priate, or in any sense needful. But I am 
here to-day in obedience to the call of duty, 
representing the Navy Department, and 
it is a pleasure to me to express the sense 
of the Navy Department of this tribute of 
yours to the memory of one of the most 
gallant officers of the service. 

I wish, in the few remarks that I shall 
make, to begin by extending my heartfelt 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 87 

thanks to my comrades of the Lafayette 
Post for giving me this great privilege of 
coming here and looking into your faces, 
and of participating in the exercises of this 
most solemn and yet joyous occasion. 

You will be glad to know, Comrades, that 
I am the bearer, to each and every one of 
you, of a message from Comrade William 
McKinley. I had the pleasure this morning, 
only a few hours ago, of paying my respects 
to the President upon his safe return. You 
will be glad to hear that he is in good health, 
and that Mrs. McKinley, although suffer- 
ing still, has stood the journey remarkably 
well. 

When I informed the President that I was 
to go to Annapolis in an hour or two, and 
told him the object of my visit, he said to 
me, "Tell the members of Lafayette Post 
that they have my best wishes, and that I 
sympathize fully with them in the object of 
their mission." 

This is indeed a beautiful ceremony of 
yours. You do all that you can, in man's 
feeble way, to hand down to posterity some 
record of one whom you admire and love 
and honor as a faithful adherent to duty. 



88 DECK AND FIELD 

Man has always, from the earliest ages, 
striven to record in some way the virtues of 
a hero, in marble or in bronze, by monument 
or by tablet. In later years, now that we have 
printing, it is not perhaps so altogether 
necessary to seek expression in marble 
and bronze. Still, the artistic sense prevails; 
and the day probably will never come when 
we shall not find erected from time to time 
monuments to such as in the opinion of 
their fellow men deserve to be thus com- 
memorated. 

In some respects, to-day is of all the days 
of the year the most beautiful, aside from 
the religious days of Christmas and Easter. 
What indeed can be more beautiful than the 
sight of this great country from ocean to 
ocean, ceasing from its daily toil, and devot- 
ing the livelong day to the one task and 
pleasure of bringing back vividly to memory 
the features of the loved ones who have gone 
before — gone after performing the highest 
duty that man has ever performed, that of 
sustaining the flag. 

It is a day dedicated to the memories of 
the past. A day distinct from all the other 
days of the year. So full are its memories, 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 89 

and so large the stream of recollections, that 
it seems almost impossible to talk upon this 
theme. Yet I cannot forbear to revert for 
a moment to the days of '6i. That year of 
'61 has in my mind a music, because (if you 
will allow me to say so) it was the year of 
my graduation from college. I can recall as 
though it were yesterday the stirring scenes 
that I witnessed in Boston the day after Fort 
Sumter was fired on. The city, I remember, 
was ablaze with excitement. Everywhere 
the flag was seen. On Beacon Street I saw 
a file of men in citizens' clothes, falling in 
behind a drummer, on their way to get to- 
gether in a military company. Only a little 
later, regiments gathered, and were march- 
ing through the streets of Boston. 

But I may not dwell on those scenes. It 
is enough to say that no one who was not 
then a living witness of what was going on 
can fully realize what the breaking-out of 
the war signified ; what the long years of 
privation and suffering, and anxiety whether 
this government could be preserved. You 
of a later generation can turn to the story 
as it is told by the ablest and most accurate 
writers, or be moved by the most stirring 



go DECK AND FIELD 

poet, and yet you do not get the reality. As 
I have said, one must have lived through it. 
Happy is that young man whose father, or 
whose near relative, took part in that great 
struggle, and is yet spared to tell him really 
what some of the scenes of those days were. 

I know that my friends here in front 
are carried back to those early days, and 
live over again that period of patriotism 
and of brotherhood, as they stood shoulder 
to shoulder. The fraternity and affection 
springing from comradeship in arms — what 
can surpass it ? 

My friends, you have come here to signify 
the love, affection, and admiration that you 
have for one of your number — the late 
Rear Admiral Richard Worsam Meade. 
You have done well to select him as a typi- 
cally brave and gallant officer of the Navy. 

My friends, the Navy, I am proud to say, 
has had many a hero ; and I believe it has 
many a hero in embryo, but you have to- 
day paid tribute to one well worthy of com- 
memoration in this chapel. Look around 
you and you will see the names of those 
honored here. Each of them has achieved 
that highest and best performance of duty, 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 91 

which has ever been the glory of the Amer- 
ican Navy. 

Richard Worsam Meade was a man not 
of the ordinary kind. He was a brave and 
gallant officer. He was a man of ideas. He 
was a man of undaunted courage. He was a 
man of penetrating vision. He was a man 
of a good deal of independence in thought 
and action. I did not have the honor and 
pleasure of knowing him personally, but I 
can say that I did know and knew well one 
of his family, a younger brother. 

This gentleman was an Acting Assistant 
Paymaster in the Navy. I met him on the 
sounds of North Carolina, and upon a short 
acquaintance I learned to respect and esteem 
him highly. "Hal" Meade was an impetu- 
ous, open-hearted, lovable fellow, showing, 
I believe, many of the characteristics of the 
Meade family. 

Then I may say here that the Board on 
Awards, on which I have been serving, lately 
had before them the case of Colonel Robert 
L. Meade, of the Marine Corps, brother 
of the late Rear Admiral Meade. Colonel 
Meade is an example of devotion to duty. 
In the recent campaign in China, although 



92 DECK AND FIELD 

confined to his bed with rheumatic gout, 
and in great pain, he insisted on getting up, 
and going out into the field. There he per- 
formed arduous duties in a most gallant 
manner. Every member of the Board was 
happy to recommend him to the Secretary 
of the Navy for the brevet of Brigadier- 
General of the Marine Corps, which honor 
has been conferred upon him. 

The Meades are all brave and gallant. 
The father of the late Rear Admiral Meade 
was himself a well-known officer, a man 
ready to do his duty under any and all cir- 
cumstances. The best traits of the officer 
whose memory you are observing to-day 
were inherited traits, such as have been 
freely exhibited in various members of his 
family. There were exemplified in his own 
person those high qualities which have dis- 
tinguished the Meade family for years. 

Let me say here, in the presence of these 
young men, how thoroughly I believe in the 
policy of keeping up the family name in the 
service, both in the Army and Navy. This 
I conceive to be one of the best means, as 
well as one of the most fruitful sources of 
obtaining a high quality of officers — that 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 93 

father and son and grandson continue in 
the service. The exercises of this day illus- 
trate the wisdom of such a course ; for, as I 
have already said, Richard Meade's father 
was a man of high reputation as an officer, 
who served his country faithfully, while the 
uncle of Rear Admiral Meade was the well- 
known Meade of Gettysburg fame. 

Richard Worsam Meade must have been 
very familiar with these beautiful grounds 
here at Annapolis. He came to the Acad- 
emy at the early age of thirteen ; and, as was 
the custom in those days, he stayed here 
only one year, and then was sent to sea. 
After that he came back again to Annapolis. 

Many years later, he was here as head 
of the department of seamanship. I am 
told by those who remember his service in 
this responsible place that here Meade de- 
veloped an originality of conception that 
proved of great value to the Academy. He 
found things in a chaotic condition. He 
introduced new methods, and carried to a 
point of such excellence the work of his 
department, that he has left his mark upon 
the annals of the Academy. 

I have no time to recite in detail his ser- 



94 DECK AND FIELD 

vices to his country. He took part in numer- 
ous engagements during the war, and was 
mentioned in general orders for gallant con- 
duct. Meade was a man who would stick to 
an idea if he considered it to be right — and 
that is the stuff that commanding officers 
and great men are made of. His career in 
the service has left behind it a reputation as 
a good sailor and a fine officer. He had one 
excellent trait, and that is, he was generous 
of praise of any officer serving under him 
who deserved favorable mention. He was a 
strict disciplinarian. He made an extraordi- 
nary cruise in the South Seas in the Narva- 
gansett, and kept his ship in splendid order. 
Indeed, it has been said of him that he could 
take a ship and keep it in thorough order 
with as little cost by way of expenditure as 
any commanding officer in the service. This 
latter accomplishment, as you may imagine, 
is appreciated at the Department. 

As an illustration of his tenacity to what 
he conceived to be right, I can relate a little 
incident, although I do not want the young 
gentlemen here to deem it a proper thing 
in the way of obeying orders. The story is 
told of Meade, that while in the department 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 95 

of seamanship, at the Academy, he was out 
on a practice cruise, commanding, I believe, 
the Dale. The commander of the squadron, 
observing that Meade's ship was not in 
proper position, ran up the signal to him, 
"You are out of station." To this Meade 
replied by signal, " The flagship is off her 
station." 

The services of this distinguished officer 
during the war were continuous and most 
valuable. It appears that several times he 
had to go to the hospital on account of ill- 
ness, but just as soon as he could get out he 
returned to duty. He had somewhat of a va- 
ried career. He was a strong man, intensely 
American in feeling, was cool, courageous, 
able — a fine type of an officer of the Navy 
of the United States. 

Rear Admiral Meade was a man, too, of 
literary tastes. He prepared one or two books 
of value. He was a great admirer of John 
Paul Jones, and had studied the subject 
thoroughly. I have heard that he delivered 
a lecture upon the career of John Paul Jones, 
and that it was an admirable presentation 
of the traits of that great officer. Meade 
believed that a statue of Jones should be 



96 DECK AND FIELD 

erected in Washington, at the southwest 
corner of Lafayette Square, across the 
Avenue from the Navy Department, and 
he worked to accomplish this result. 

I wish I could go on longer and talk about 
the subject of this tablet, because it is inter- 
esting to all of us; certainly to the cadets 
here, and to you gentlemen of the Post 
who knew him personally — but I must con- 
clude. 

I only want to say a single word more, and 
that to my young friends of the Academy. 1 
I would have you young gentlemen draw a 
lesson from such a scene as this. The lesson 
is that the Republic is grateful. You have 
sometimes heard it said that republics are un- 
grateful. That expression was coined years 
and years ago, in the days of Athens, I be- 
lieve. It has no application to our country. 
The Republic of the United States is grate- 
ful, and that gratitude is shown in various 
ways. This is one of the ways in which it is 
shown. Here is a tablet put up to-day — it 
has come about in the natural order of events 
— in honor of a man who had done his duty. 
To do his duty was the keynote of his life, 

1 See Appendix V. 



RICHARD WORSAM MEADE 97 

and this is the lesson that you will draw from 
the scene around you to-day. 

Some of you are about to go out from these 
surroundings, and enter upon the more ac- 
tive duties of your profession. Remember 
that the keynote of your conduct through 
life should be a firm adherence to duty. Be 
true to this sentiment, and you will succeed. 
You will become, as your predecessors in the 
Navy have been, — a credit and an honor to 
the United States. 



VIII 

THOMAS TINGEY 



VIII 

ADDRESS AT THE UNVEILING OF A 
TABLET IN MEMORY OF CAPTAIN 
THOMAS TINGEY, U. S. N. 

AT THE NAVY YARD WASHINGTON DIS- 
TRICT OF COLUMBIA NOVEMBER 28 1906 

[The ceremony of unveiling the tablet fixed to the 
wall of the Commandant's house took place at the 
Navy Yard at eleven o'clock, forenoon, of Wednes- 
day, the 28th of November, 1906, under the charge of 
the Commandant, Captain Eugene Henry Cozzens 
Leutze, U. S. N. A respectable concourse of people 
were present. A large body of marines and sailors 
stood in line with the entire Marine Band. 

Prayer was offered by the Reverend Arthur Johns, 
Rector of Christ Church (near the Navy Yard), where 
Captain Tingey had been a vestryman. The Secretary 
of the Navy (Bonaparte), after saying a few words 
appropriate to the occasion, withdrew the drapery 
that concealed the tablet. The band played the Na- 
tional Anthem, and a Captain's salute was fired. The 
tablet bears the following inscription : — 

Died in this house February 23, 1829, Captain 
Thomas Tingey, United States Navy, who for 
almost half a century served his country as an 
officer of the Navy. He laid out this Navy Yard 
and for twenty-eight years was its commandant. 



102 DECK AND FIELD 

Ex-Secretaries of the Navy, Chandler and Herbert, 
were present, as was Judge Alexander B. Hagner, 
President of the Columbia Historical Society. Mrs. 
J. H. Chichester, of Fairfax County, Virginia, the 
only living grandchild of Captain Tingey, was among 
the ladies in attendance. Lieutenant Thomas Tingey 
Craven, U. S. N., great-grandson of Captain Tingey } 
and Robert, son of the late T. A. M. Craven, U. S. N., 
likewise attended the exercises.] 

The American people have awakened to 
the value of historic associations. They are 
minded that hereafter no site of a note- 
worthy public event shall go unmarked. In 
this spirit we are here to commemorate the 
beginnings of the Washington Navy Yard. 
Congress, by Act of February 2, 1799, 
authorized the building of six ships, of 
seventy-four guns each. The Secretary of 
the Navy named Washington as a place 
where one of the ships should be built. He 
bought for four thousand dollars a tract of 
forty acres here on the Eastern Branch. 
Benjamin Stoddert, of Georgetown, was a 
sagacious man of business. He looked the 
country over to discover a person suited to 
the task of laying out and getting into work- 
ing order the new Yard. He had in hand 
plans drawn by the ingenious Latrobe, but 



THOMAS TINGEY 103 

what he wanted was a man of administra- 
tive ability, of experience, and of sound 
judgment as to building and fitting-out ships- 
of-war, and maintaining a plant for speedy 
repairs. Such men were rare in those days. 

There was living, however, at Kingston, 
New Jersey, " an officer," to quote the Secre- 
tary's words, " of great merit in our service. 
. . . A man of understanding, who, having 
seen the navy yards of England," would " be 
able to direct the laying-out of that in Wash- 
ington to the greatest advantage." In obe- 
dience to a summons this officer came here 
in midwinter to a place that was little better 
than a wilderness. Walking around the tract 
— at some points drifted snow had cov- 
ered up the stake and stone — the newcomer 
examined the lay of the land and the water 
facilities, and pronounced the site " eligibly 
chosen." With the advance of the season he 
erected a high board fence, and had men at 
work building a wharf. From this date down 
to February, 1829, the man diligently applied 
himself to the growth and development of 
this Yard ; and when death overtook him 
here, at the age of almost eighty, all Wash- 
ington mourned the loss of a friend. To-day 



104 DECK AND FIELD 

we do honor to the memory of Captain 
Thomas Tingey of the United States Navy. 

The son of a clergyman, he was born at 
London, England, on the i ith of September, 
1 750. When not quite twenty-one he was put 
in command of a blockade house and a guard 
of twenty-two men at Chateaux Bay, on the 
coast of Labrador. This was Fort Pitt, built 
in 1763 to protect the fisheries. Tingey 's 
orders were from Commodore Byron, then 
Governor of Newfoundland, — grandfather 
of the poet, — a somewhat eccentric com- 
mander, known to the service as " Foul 
Weather Jack." They bear date 31st July, 
1 771, from on board the Panther, at St. 
John's; and they direct Mr. Tingey to pro- 
ceed in the sloop Nautilus to his lonely 
destination. 

Tradition says that young Tingey re- 
signed from the British Navy because of a 
difficulty with another officer. However this 
may be, he seems to have found his way to 
these colonies. The statement also rests on 
tradition that he served in the Continental 
Navy, and at the close of the Revolutionary 
War made his home in New Jersey, where 
he entered into trade with the East Indies. 



THOMAS TINGEY 105 

Some time, while our infant Navy was get- 
ting itself started, Tingey appears to have 
returned to his profession ; and by the last 
years of the century he had gained repute 
as an officer of superior talent. Upon the 
reorganization of the Navy, in 1798, the 
President named him as one of the additional 
captains, and gave to his commission the 
earliest date of the five then appointed. Cap- 
tain Tingey was assigned to the command 
of the Ganges, twenty-four guns, then fitting 
out for sea at Marcus Hook. He ranked 
third in the squadron for the West Indies, 
his seniors being Barry and Truxtun. 

Two small vessels were added to his com- 
mand, and he was ordered to guard the 
Windward Passage, between Hispaniola 
and Cuba. The duty of protecting our mer- 
chant vessels against the attack of French 
privateers he performed with spirit and with 
due circumspection. 

One day the Ganges was entering the 
port of St. Thomas. Her commander had 
learned that it was the intention of the 
Danish authorities, when he should have 
saluted their flag, to return the salute with a 
smaller number of guns. He sent an officer 



106 DECK AND FIELD 

on shore to inform the commandant of the 
port that the Danish flag would be saluted 
only upon condition of return of gun for 
gun. Needless to say, the condition was 
complied with. 

During the same year (1799), Tingey fell 
in with a British frigate, whose captain dis- 
patched an officer to the Ganges to make 
inquiries with regard to the presence on 
board of British seamen. Captain Tingey 
was informed that his simple assurance 
would be sufficient to prevent an officer 
being sent to examine the protections of his 
crew. "I did not hesitate to say," so he re- 
ports to the Department, "that I considered 
all my crew Americans, born or adopted; 
but I told the officer further that I did not 
believe there was one single protection in 
the ship, the only one we carried in our pub- 
lic ships being our flag." He adds that he had 
declared to his officers a purpose to fall at 
his post rather than submit to an investi- 
gation ; and that he had pledged himself to 
his crew that not a man of them should be 
taken from the ship by any force whatever 
while he was able to stand at quarters. In 
replying, March 7, 1799, the Secretary says: 



THOMAS TINGEY 107 

The President highly approves of the con- 
duct you pursued with regard to the British 
frigate you fell in with." This behavior on 
the part of Captain Tingey furnishes one of 
the earliest instances of that determined 
resolution evinced by the little American 
Navy, which at last compelled England to 
abandon the position she had assumed of 
exercising the right to take away a man 
whom she deemed to be a British subject 
from whatever deck she might find him. 

What with convoying merchant vessels, 
visiting different harbors, and chasing pri- 
vateers, Tingey was kept busy enough. His 
most important capture was that of the 
Vainqueur, eight guns and eighty-five men, 
a swift vessel, overhauled only after a chase 
of ninety miles. Upon the signing of the 
treaty of peace with France our Navy was 
reduced, and many officers, of whom Tingey 
was one, were discharged. He returned to 
his home in New Jersey, and again applied 
himself to mercantile pursuits. 

But the public demand for a Navy, which 
Congress in part had answered by providing 
for these six seventy-fours, would not suffer 
such a man as Tingey to remain long out 



108 DECK AND FIELD 

of the service. As we have seen, he was sent 
for to come to Washington and call into 
existence a Navy Yard. 

He was first made Superintendent, and 
then, in 1804, by virtue of a special act of 
Congress, he was reappointed a captain in 
the Navy and Commandant of this Yard. 
Energy and discretion marked his adminis- 
tration of affairs. He was zealous and un- 
tiring. The valuable historic sketch of the 
Yard, by Chaplain Hibben, speaks of its 
first Commandant in terms of unqualified 
praise. It alludes particularly to the mass of 
letters on file at the Department, all writ- 
ten in his own hand, as proving with what 
painstaking fidelity he looked after details 
of these many exacting duties. 

In 1808 Tingey submitted to the Secre- 
tary of the Navy a set of rules for the gov- 
ernment of the Yard. So well adapted were 
they to their purpose that the Department 
applied them to every Yard on the coast. 
Preble says that they appear to be the basis 
out of which have grown all the subsequent 
regulations for the government of our Navy 
Yards. 

There is a chapter in our early annals of 



THOMAS TINGEY 109 

which, it would seem, we have small rea- 
son to be proud. In 18 14, when the British 
forces entered Washington, the responsibil- 
ity lay upon Captain Tingey of protecting 
this Navy Yard, with its vessels and stores. 

Much working at cross-purposes, and 
consequent confusion, marked what by a 
stretch of courtesy may be entitled the de- 
fense of Washington on that unfortunate 
occasion. Upon the night of the 24th of 
August three great fires lighted up the sky. 
There were burning at the same time the 
Capitol, the White House, and the Navy 
Yard. Secretary Jones had given to Captain 
Tingey a positive order (said to have been 
agreed to by the unanimous vote of the 
entire cabinet), which compelled that officer 
most reluctantly to apply the torch. Fortu- 
nately, the house of the Commandant was 
spared from the flames. Tingey's report of 
his performance of this duty reveals the char- 
acter of the man. 

Captain Tingey, during his long residence 
here, showed himself to be a good citizen 
as well as a valuable officer. He took a 
lively interest in what was going on in 
Washington. He knew and liked the towns- 



no DECK AND FIELD 

people. They liked and admired the " Com- 
modore," as the Commandant of a Navy 
Yard was in that day popularly styled. His 
name heads the list of the vestry of Christ 
Church in 1806. He was an incorporator 
of the cemetery of that church — now the 
Congressional Cemetery. His remains lie at 
the entrance, close to the office of the Su- 
perintendent, so that the stone to his mem- 
ory is the first object that greets the visitor. 

Captain Tingey was a man of fine propor- 
tions and of handsome features. He had a 
dignified and courtly bearing. He was fond 
of society, where his knowledge of the world 
and really kind heart made him a general 
favorite. He maintained health and strength 
to an unusual age, and was " busy in these 
scenes until the last plaudit." 

Is it too much to believe that this excel- 
lent officer had transmitted to his descend- 
ants somewhat of his own gallant spirit? 
His grandson, Thomas Tingey Craven, born 
at this Yard, fought the Brooklyn at the 
passage of the forts below New Orleans ; 
while another grandson (brother to Thomas), 
Tunis Augustus MacDonough Craven, went 
down with his ironclad Tecumseh, in Mobile 



THOMAS TINGEY in 

Bay, quietly stepping to one side at the foot 
of the ladder, that the pilot might rush up 
and escape with his life. 

May this Yard long continue to prosper 
and grow more and more useful to the 
country. Happy, indeed, is it that its early 
fortunes were presided over by so true a 
man as Thomas Tingey. 



IX 

CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 



IX 



PAPER READ BEFORE THE DISTRICT 
OF COLUMBIA COMMANDERY OF THE 
MILITARY ORDER OF THE LOYAL 
LEGION OF THE UNITED STATES 
NOVEMBER i 1899 

COMMEMORATING LIEUTENANT-COMMAN- 
DER CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER, 
U. S. N., IN THE FIGHT WITH THE CON- 
FEDERATE RAM ALBEMARLE 

In the autumn of 1862, the United States 
steam gunboat Miami, after having done 
picket duty on James River, was ordered 
from Hampton Roads to the Sounds of North 
Carolina. The Miami had been built some- 
what hastily at the Navy Yard, Philadelphia, 
and was, I believe, the first to be launched 
of a class of double-enders, so called. She 
was a large paddle-wheel steamer, with a 
long flush deck, and furnished with steering- 
gear and a rudder at the bow as well as stern, 
so that she would run forward or backward, 
an important advantage in river service, for 



n6 DECK AND FIELD 

which this class of light-draught vessels had 
been designed. 

As a matter of fact, it turned out that 
she ran much better stern foremost. Her 
capacity for taking a sheer was phenomenal. 
Before I was ordered to her as an acting 
assistant paymaster she had been with Por- 
ter's mortar fleet below New Orleans. Here 
she managed to inspire almost as much dread 
in our own fleet as on the part of the enemy; 
and her wayward behavior had gained for 
her the nickname of the "Miasnta." 

In the hope of checking this propensity to 
run into other ships, an enormous wheel had 
been placed upon her hurricane deck, with 
the pilot protected in part by sheets of boiler 
iron set upright. For all her eccentricity, 
the Miami proved to be a comfortable ship 
to live in, with plenty of deck-room. She 
carried a very formidable battery. We had 
four nine-inch Dahlgrens on either side, a 
nine-inch pivot aft, and a hundred-pound 
Parrott rifle forward, besides a complement 
of howitzers. 

Our commander was Acting Lieutenant 
Robert Townsend — a fine officer of the old 
school. He had resigned from the service 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 117 

some time before the war, but had now re- 
turned when his country needed him. In 
the fight with the forts below New Orleans, 
when he was executive officer of the Miami, 
Townsend had displayed admirable coolness 
and bravery. He had many accomplishments, 
was of polished manners, and devoted to 
reading. He was large and fine-looking. 
Though he wore his hair in short ringlets 
and was of a benignant countenance, he ex- 
hibited unusual strength of character. Cap- 
tain Townsend, in fine, was liked by all on 
board, for all had the fullest confidence in 
his ability and courage. 

After some months of service at Wash- 
ington and other points, we were, much to 
our regret, deprived of our commanding offi- 
cer, for the Department, knowing the value 
of Townsend's qualifications, detached him 
and ordered him to the command of the iron- 
clad Essex on the upper Mississippi. His 
place was supplied temporarily by Comman- 
der Henry K. Davenport, then the senior 
officer in command in North Carolina 
waters. 

On the 8th of May, 1863, all hands were 
mustered to witness the turning over of 



n8 DECK AND FIELD 

the command to Lieutenant-Commander 
Charles W. Flusser. This gallant young 
officer (for he was scarcely thirty years of 
age) was no stranger to us, or to any sailor 
or soldier who had served on the North 
Carolina coast. No sooner, indeed, had we 
reached Hatteras Inlet, on our way to the 
Sounds, than we began to hear of Flusser and 
his achievements. The story of his dashing 
straight at the rebel flagship in the action 
at Roanoke Island, and his hailing Com- 
modore Lynch with " Get out your fenders," 
and of his unceasing activity in these waters 
with the Commodore Perry, a man-of-war 
improvised out of a ferryboat, was a topic of 
admiring conversation time and time again 
among officers and men. We knew that he 
had a brilliant career in prospect; in fact, he 
had already gained great distinction. Flusser 
was the one man in the Sounds of North 
Carolina whom everybody, afloat or ashore, 
regarded as a born leader, a daring yet wise 
commander. 

It may well be imagined, therefore, that 
we felt honored at having such an officer 
for our captain. Flusser looked like a man 
capable of great deeds. You could not be in 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 119 

his presence without at once seeing that he 
was of a superior mettle. He was a little 
below medium height, sparely built, of light 
complexion, bronzed from exposure, with a 
large and piercing eye, and a long tawny 
moustache, the ends of which he some- 
times unconsciously pulled while talking. A 
favorite article of dress with him was a 
blue jacket given open to the breeze, without 
waistcoat, and his cap had a habit of perch- 
ing itself jauntily to one side. While lying 
off Plymouth there was much time to go 
ashore; and our captain used to be a good 
deal on horseback, generally at full speed, 
for it was his habit to move quickly whether 
on deck or on land. 

Sailors, among themselves, habitually 
speak of the commanding officer as " The 
Old Man," with a fine disregard for actual 
years. It seemed no way inappropriate that 
gray-haired petty officers should allude to 
Captain Flusser as " The Old Man," he 
appearing to them, as he did, the embodi- 
ment of so much authority and dignity. 

Our new commander had not been a week 
on board before a marked change became 
visible in the discipline of the crew. Every- 



120 DECK AND FIELD 

thing about the ship was put in first-class 
man-of-war order. Drills were more frequent 
and more exacting, and the rattle would be 
sprung at any moment, when least looked 
for, to call us to quarters. A sense of graver 
responsibility seemed to rest upon each one 
of us officers. 

Our chief station remained, as before, at 
Plymouth, a small town that straggled along 
the right bank of the Roanoke, not a great 
distance above its mouth, where it empties 
into Albemarle Sound. For much of the 
time the stream at Plymouth, which has no 
great width, is turbid and yellow. The Union 
forces, it should be explained, held Hatteras 
Inlet, Roanoke Island, Plymouth, Washing- 
ton, New Berne, and, at the ocean, More- 
head City — the two latter positions being 
connected by a railroad that we operated. To 
get from one of our points to another (save 
only by this railroad connection) required a 
long detour by water. It had been a dream 
of Flusser, from the first, to steam up the 
Roanoke, and in cooperation with the army, 
to seize and occupy Weldon, a point of vital 
consequence in the defense of Richmond ; 
but the plan was never attempted. 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 121 

Flusser knew no idle moments. He had 
early applied himself to a study of the topo- 
graphy of this region, the facilities of com- 
munication by land and by water, the char- 
acter of the people, the extent of the lurking 
Union sentiment ; in a word, of all that vari- 
ety of detail whose acquisition goes far to 
make a military mind the master of the situ- 
ation. He never lost an opportunity to keep 
close watch of what the enemy was doing, 
or was likely to do ; and he managed some- 
how, with more or less regularity, to get news 
from the interior. The Raleigh " Standard," 
printed, I remember, on a half-sheet of coarse 
paper, used to find its way through our lines 
at repeated intervals. Our captain knew 
"Johnny Reb " and his methods pretty thor- 
oughly, and he was not easily deceived. 

I may say here that Flusser, who was 
of Maryland birth, had entered the Navy, 
in 1847, f rom Kentucky. His two brothers, 
Ottaker and Guy, served in the rebel army. 
Both were killed ; one, way in the advance 
at Malvern Hill. Intensely loyal was Flusser. 
To his young sister, the only other mem- 
ber of the family who had remained true to 
the Union, he wrote : " As for me, you may 



122 DECK AND FIELD 

expect me to do my duty. All that I am I 
owe to my country." A letter written by him 
to Captain Tatnall of the Navy, who had re- 
signed to go South, was, as I recall it, scorch- 
ing in the terms with which he denounced 
treachery to the flag. So ardent were the 
feelings of this noble spirit that, when his 
own brother sent word by flag-of-truce that 
he would like to meet Charles and talk with 
him, the latter refused to consider it. 

Let us pass over the narrative of expedi- 
tions made to various points, and over many 
events of minor importance, to come directly 
to the subject of this paper — the rebel ram 
Albemarle, and the tragic story of Flusser's 
heroism in his conflict with that historic 
ironclad vessel. 

The startling success of the Merrimac in 
her attack upon the Cumberland and the 
Congress emboldened the little Confederate 
Navy with hopes of victory elsewhere over 
wooden hulls. Our naval commanders were 
not unaware of the danger. As early as Oc- 
tober, 1862, Rear Admiral Lee, in command 
of the North Atlantic Squadron, urged upon 
the Secretary of the Navy the necessity of 
building ironclads of light draught for ser- 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 123 

vice in North Carolina waters and elsewhere. 
The subject was considered, and the Navy 
Department contracted with private builders 
for twenty of these vessels, some of which, 
by the terms of the contract, were to be 
completed as early as September, 1863; but 
for various reasons the construction was 
faulty, and this class of "monitors" was 
never available. 

Soon after the first arrival of the Miami 
at Plymouth, where the Commodore Perry 
and some smaller gunboats were on guard, 
rumors became rife that the enemy were at 
work further up the river, upon an ironclad, 
supposed to be building somewhere near 
Hamilton. When Flusser took command, 
and our permanent station was off Plym- 
outh, the rebel ram continued to be a lively 
topic of conversation; but, of course, I knew 
nothing of what information the captain had 
from time to time gathered, nor till a much 
later period did I learn what were his plans 
of defense against her. 

The private letters, preserved at the Navy 
Department, from Captain Flusser to Cap- 
tain Davenport of the Hetzel, at New Berne, 
I have now, after the lapse of thirty-five 



124 DECK AND FIELD 

years, had an opportunity to read. They 
bring back vividly those scenes of the past. 
It must be premised that Flussergave timely 
intelligence to his superiors of what was 
going on. So great a confidence did the 
Secretary of the Navy have in his judgment 
and fertility of resource that at a very early 
period he sent for Lieutenant-Commander 
Flusser to come to Washington to confer 
on the subject of the threatened incursion 
of this formidable craft. The visit was hur- 
riedly paid, just as soon as it had been au- 
thoritatively learned that the ram was under 
construction. Flusser writes, 2 2d July, 1863: 
"The floating battery and steamer up the 
river at Edwards Ferry are having their irons 
put on. They could be destroyed by 500 
cavalry, landing at Winton, and marching 
on them with some combustibles. If they 
are not destroyed, they will give us trouble 
yet. Keep it quiet and suggest it to Foster 
or Potter." Later, on 9th October, he says, 
" There is another report of the Roanoke 
sheep. It is said she is surely coming down 
now in a few days, and as I intend to sink 
her, and need the aid of the Southfield, I 
know of no one whom I would rather have 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 125 

to aid me than French." This was Acting 
Volunteer Lieutenant Charles A. French, 
an officer of much merit, upon whom Flusser 
placed great reliance. On 27th October he 
sent word of a report that the ram had sunk 
when launched, expressing his doubt as to 
whether this be not "a weak invention of 
the enemy." Again, on 8th November, he 
says : " There was a report that the ram was 
to have been at Plymouth on Thursday last. 
No attack yet. If the battery they contem- 
plate putting up there to hold one hun- 
dred-pounder and one two hundred-pounder 
was complete, I think I should be glad to see 
the boat come down. At any rate, with what 
we have I '11 try pretty hard to whip her. 
Send up the Southfieldr On November 16 : 
" I have kept the Delaware here because I 
thought the ram might come down. Last 
report from above is that she sunk while 
launching, and that the rebs are blocking up 
the river with stones — both lies, I suspect. 
I am trying to make one more torpedo." 
Five days later, he says, " I think we will 
have time to put things in good order before 
our friend from above ventures down. I re- 
quired six hulls from the Admiral. I think 



126 DECK AND FIELD 

the Army will send some." These hulls he 
intended to sink in the channel above as 
an obstruction. He sent to the Admiral a 
well-designed plan for sinking these obstruc- 
tions with torpedoes, but his plan could not 
be, or at least was not, acted upon. On 25th 
November, 1863, he writes: "The Admiral 
seems to think it was scarcely worth while 
to block up the river here. If he thinks so, 
I do tarn bien, so I suppose he '11 soon send 
you orders for the light-boats here." (These 
were strong vessels that in peace times were 
used to display a light, anchored off danger- 
ous shoals in the Sounds.) " In the mean- 
time I shall build some torpedoes, and have 
the boats ready to sink, in case we hear that 
the vessel is more formidable or more nearly 
completed than we now think her." 

These letters were written usually from 
Plymouth. Flusser had one or two small 
gunboats with him with which he would 
occasionally go out into the Sound, up the 
Chowan River, or to other points where 
guerrillas were heard from. 

Any one who has been on a ship in war 
times knows the rapidity with which rumors 
of all sorts and descriptions pass among the 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 127 

crew and in the smoking-room of the officers. 
Of course, as we chatted nobody appeared to 
know anything of the plans of the captain. 
We all had an implicit faith that he would 
be equal to any emergency that might arise. 
It was a pretty serious prospect, however, 
that of an ironclad vessel coming down to 
attack us, who depended solely on wooden 
walls. As a precautionary measure a water 
battery had been built just above the town 
of Plymouth, and a two-hundred-pound rifle- 
gun mounted there. It was intended to keep 
a sharp lookout and sink the invader by one 
well-directed shot from this powerful gun. 
It is hardly needful to add that we had a 
picket-boat up the river constantly on duty. 

We may turn aside for a moment to men- 
tion an incident that shows what type of man 
was the officer of whom we are speaking. 
The troops on shore, holding Plymouth be- 
hind strong fortifications, were about two 
thousand in number, under command of one 
of the best soldiers in the army, Brigadier- 
General Henry W. Wessells, a man as brave 
as he was modest. 

Flusser writes to Davenport, under date 
of March 4, 1864, as follows: — 



128 DECK AND FIELD 

In the New York " Herald " of the 27th ult. 
there appears a silly article about General Wes- 
sells and myself. I had not observed it till General 
Wessells spoke to me of it, and showed me a let- 
ter he had written to General Peck concerning it. 
I requested him to state that it was equally repug- 
nant to me as to him. I have no desire for news- 
paper notoriety. Will you do me the favor to 
ascertain who it was who wrote it, and have the 
thing stopped for the future ? Such articles may 
be intended to do an officer good, but they injure 
his reputation among officers — those whose opin- 
ion he regards, and can only avail with the masses, 
whose good opinion, if undeserved, he should 
despise, or at least be ashamed of possessing. 

The " Herald " article reads : — 

New Berne, February 24, 1864. 

From Plymouth we learn that C. W. Flusser, 
the Naval hero of these waters, commanding the 
Naval forces of that point, is, as usual, ready and 
very anxious to see the enemy. General Wessells, 
in command of the Army forces there, who en- 
joys a great popularity with his troops and the 
people, has sent word to General Peck that he and 
Flusser can hold Plymouth against any force the 
enemy may send. 

The test of ability in an officer in time of 
war is found in the success that he achieves 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 129 

with the instruments given him to work with. 
Flusser had, besides his own ship, with its 
heavy weight of metal, the Southfield, under 
French, a large and powerful boat that had 
been taken from the Staten Island Ferry. 
She, too, carried a fine battery — her vulner- 
able point being, of course, her exposed ma- 
chinery — together with the Whitehead and 
the Ceres, both small and chiefly serviceable 
for picket duty. Flusser writes Davenport 
under date of 1 3th May, 1 864 : " I like General 
Wessells ; we will get along comfortably to- 
gether." As a matter of fact, he entertained 
a justly high opinion of Wessells's capacity 
and soldierly qualities. The cooperation of 
the two officers was hearty and most effect- 
ual. There was nothing in Flusser of that 
complaining spirit that waits to have a com- 
plete outfit before daring to make an attempt. 
He was content to go ahead and do his best 
with what means were actually put into his 
hands. He perfectly well knew, for instance, 
the numerous obstacles that prevented the 
hurried building and hastening to him of a 
light-draught monitor. He determined to be 
ready on the instant to cope with the ene- 
my's ironclad, no matter whether the Navy 



130 DECK AND FIELD 

Department should send him armored ves- 
sels or not. He was fertile of invention, and 
quick to see the true bearings of offense 
and defense under new conditions. 

Flusser's plan was a simple one. It was 
to lash together the Miami and the South- 
field. They were to be securely chained, so 
that the two vessels could be handled as 
one. By running directly upon the ram and 
getting her between the two ships, so that 
the forward guns of each could play upon 
her sides, he was confident that he would 
have the iron monster at his mercy. 

The sequel will show why the plan could 
not be carried into effect. In April, when 
the days were growing longer, the weather 
milder, and the river was running full 
from recent rains, ominous signs told us 
that the long-expected attack was nigh at 
hand. 

Flusser wrote to his young sister on the 
1 2th: "I shall have a formidable antago- 
nist, little one, but I shall not fail to ask 
God's aid." 

On Sunday afternoon, the 17th, about 
five o'clock, our captain came hastily on 
board, and we went at once to quarters. Our 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 131 

outer pickets, it seems, had been driven in ; 
and there was reason to believe that the 
enemy were advancing in force. A mile or 
so up the river, in plain sight of our ship, 
was an earthwork called Fort Gray. We 
soon saw puffs of smoke indicating firing 
from the fort ; and the engagement at that 
point not long after became very brisk. I 
remember with what feelings of mingled 
sadness and indignation I saw our flag shot 
down. But the gallant fellows at the fort 
quickly replaced it upon, I believe, a tree 
near by. All Monday there was skirmish- 
ing at the front. About six o'clock in the 
evening we fell to work loosing the chains 
and hawsers that bound us to the Southfield. 
This was done that the Miami might drop 
down the river to the lower picket station, 
while the Southfield went up, so that each 
could shell the enemy. The aid given by 
our nine-inch guns was timely, and of essen- 
tial service in repelling the furious assaults. 
We knew for a certainty that the ram would 
be down that night. 

Late on Monday, Flusser sent off a brief 
dispatch to Davenport, and with it this, the 
last letter he ever wrote : — 



i 3 2 DECK AND FIELD 

Miami, Plymouth, N. C, 18th April, 1864. 

My dear Davenport, — The Army has been 
engaged with the enemy off and on all day. 

About sunset the rebs advanced along our whole 
line, but were driven back. They were obstinate, 
and continued to fight till near nine o'clock. The 
Southfield and Miami took part, and the General 
says our firing was admirable. 

I am fearful for Fort Gray. The enemy have 
established a battery of long-range guns above it, 
with which they would sink all our boats if we 
went near enough to the fort to fire grape and 
canister into the enemy's infantry. They sunk 
the Army steamer Bombshell to-day, temporarily 
under command of Ensign Stokes, who fought 
her well. 

I gave the Army to-day one hundred projectiles 
for one-hundred-pounder Parrott. Please send 
powder, shot, and shells for that gun, for nine- 
inch and for twenty-pounder Parrott. 

The ram will be down to-night or to-morrow. 
She was just after daylight this morning foul of 
a tree six miles above Williamston. I think, if she 
does n't stay under cover of their battery estab- 
lished above Fort Gray, that we shall whip her. I 
had to destroy the obstruction in the Thorough- 
fare as the Whitehead was above, and could not 
run by the battery placed below her on the Roa- 
noke. 

I have written the Admiral. 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 133 

The 85th Redoubt repulsed three obstinate 
assaults, but the enemy remain near it. 
In great haste, 

Yours sincerely, 

C. W. Flusser. 

It was a custom of the writer in these pri- 
vate and confidential letters to send his com- 
pliments to the naval officers at New Berne. 
The letter I have just read is written on a 
half-sheet of letter-paper; at the bottom of 
the reverse of the sheet are a few blots of 
ink. The instinct of the gentleman asserts 
itself in this : that at the supreme moment 
of the imminence of an attack from a most 
formidable antagonist he should quietly add 
these words : " Remember me to your offi- 
cers. Did not know this sheet was blotted 
till I wrote the other side." 

The Southfield 'and the Miami had again 
been laid side by side and preparations be- 
gun to secure them as before. I can recall as 
if it were but yesterday the scene at about 
midnight. The moon was shining. The men 
were resting at the guns. The officer of the 
deck took his customary walk up and down. 
Everything was ready at a moment's notice. 
Captain Flusser seated himself on the low 



134 DECK AND FIELD 

edge of the starboard rail, I think it was, in 
the opening for the range of the pivot gun, 
on the quarter-deck. I sat there with him. 
His face wore the calm yet determined look 
that usually characterized him, but I fancied 
that he was a trifle more kindly in tone than 
was his wont. Perhaps it was a relief to him 
to talk of other subjects than that which was 
necessarily uppermost in our minds. I re- 
member his telling a story of a man who was 
chased by an Indian, and who had crept into 
the hollow of a log ; there he peeped out and 
saw the Indian brandishing his tomahawk 
and sounding the war-whoop. "Warn't I 
mad," said he; " I was so mad that — I — I 
— could have eaten a broiled chicken ! " The 
captain bade me a cheerful good-night as I 
went below to " turn in with my boots on." It 
seemed but a few moments when the spring- 
ing of the rattle called us to quarters. Shortly 
the word came to me, in the powder division 
aft, that Captain Flusser was killed, but that 
the men must not know it. 

The Albemarle, for so the ram was called, 
waiting until the moon had gone down, had 
passed over the obstructions (such was the 
depth of the water), had dropped slowly 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 135 

down the river on the further bank beneath 
the trees, and slipped by the water-battery 
without a shot being fired at her, then slant- 
ing her course had run her prow into the 
Southfteld, which was on our port side. The 
Southfield almost immediately sank, carry- 
ing under a portion of the ram with her. As 
the iron monster lay abaft our port bow, the 
first broadside gun forward of the engine 
shaft almost reached her with its muzzle. 
Flusser, it seems, himself held the lanyard 
of the gun. The captain of the gun said to 
him quickly, " There 's a shell, sir, in that 
gun." " Never mind, my lad," said he, " we'll 
give them this first, and solid shot after." 
With that he pulled the lockstring; the shell 
exploded on the iron side of the ram; frag- 
ments of it came back upon the Miami, 
and Flusser was instantly killed. The officer 
of the division, Acting Ensign Thomas G. 
Hargis, was so severely wounded that in a 
few days after, he died. One of the engin- 
eers also was slightly wounded, and one or 
two of the men, but not seriously. Flusser's 
presence at the gun was not chargeable 
to undue exposure of himself, but rather to 
the necessity he was under of seeing with 



136 DECK AND FIELD 

his own eyes the precise position of the 
enemy. 

At the sinking of the Southfield, her com- 
manding officer, French, a few other officers, 
and several of the crew jumped on board 
our ship. The moorings had been parted by 
the shock, and we were clear to take our 
own course. Instant decision had to be 
made. Single-handed we were no match for 
this ironclad ram, and we slowly steamed 
down the river, stern foremost, firing our 
bow gun. The ram fired at us once or twice, 
but the shot did not take effect. Some of 
the Southfield complement were drowned 
and others taken prisoners. 

Had Flusser lived, in my judgment we 
should have either whipped the ram or been 
sunk by her. I firmly believe we should have 
gained the victory. This result I would at- 
tribute not wholly to the indomitable brav- 
ery and the quickly applied ingenuity of 
our commander, but in a measure to the 
unity of plan that he had resolved upon. 
Again, the inspiration that the living man 
was to the officers and crew was something 
indescribable. The action of Captain French 
in withdrawing the Miami from the river 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 137 

was prudent and praiseworthy. In trying 
circumstances that officer exhibited a for- 
titude and discretion that entitle him to 
grateful remembrance. 

The body of the lamented Flusser, cov- 
ered with the flag, was taken to New Berne, 
where every honor was accorded it. His 
dust now hallows a beautiful spot in the 
grounds of the Naval Academy at Annap- 
olis — an object of inspiration, let us hope, 
to the young gentlemen for generations yet 
to come to whom the country confides her 
naval honor. 

The action of May 5, 1864, in the Sound 
between the Albemarle and eight wooden 
gunboats, under command of Captain Me- 
lancthon Smith; her retreat and her subse- 
quent destruction by the intrepid Cushing, 
are well known in history. 

One incident attending the death of Flus- 
ser deserves to be mentioned here, since it 
is not generally known. The Albemarle was 
fought with skill and daring by the Confed- 
erate Commander James W. Cooke, whom 
Flusser well knew as a former officer of the 
United States Navy. In the engagement at 



138 DECK AND FIELD 

Elizabeth City, North Carolina, February 10, 
1862, Cooke commanded the Ellis, a small 
paddle-wheel ferry-boat. She was driven on 
shore under fire from our gunboats and 
grounded in two feet of water. Cooke gave 
orders for his men to save themselves, and 
they threw their muskets on deck and scram- 
bled for shore. Cooke himself stayed on 
board the Ellis, firing with the abandoned 
muskets. 

Flusser, in a launch from the Commodore 
Perry, boarded the Ellis and, recognizing 
Cooke as an old shipmate, ordered his men 
not to shoot, but to capture him. Cooke had 
been knocked down with the butt of a mus- 
ket, and lay on his back slashing about with 
his sword and refusing to surrender. He 
was finally seized, carried a prisoner to the 
Commodore Perry, and later was paroled 
and exchanged. 

When Captain Cooke of the Albemarle 
learned of Flusser's death, he expressed sor- 
row, especially that it should have occurred 
in combat with himself, whose life Flusser 
had saved about two years before. 

The Confederates having thus got control 
of the river, their forces under General Hoke 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 139 

assaulted our .fortifications, and Wessells, 
after a most heroic defense, was compelled 
to yield to superior numbers. Wessells's 
official re] o t is a model of its kind. His 
tribute to Captain Flusser breathes a spirit 
..of maeianimity and admiration. 

Rear Admiral Lee writes to the Secretary 
of the Navy under date of April 23, 1864: 
" This brave officer was a native of Mary- 
land and a citizen of Kentucky. His patri- 
otic and distinguished services had won for 
him the respect and esteem of the Navy and 
his country. He was generous, good, and 
gallant, and his untimely death is a real and 
great loss to the public service." 

These are not the studied words of empty 
praise. They express in moderate terms 
what everybody who knew Flusser sincerely 
thought of him. Had he lived, Flusser would 
undoubtedly have risen to high rank in his 
profession. His ambition was of the right 
stuff — a devotion to duty and a love of 
country that knew no danger too great for 
him to encounter in her defense. 

Though a man of the world, this distin- 
guished officer felt the full force of the seri- 
ous side of life. I have it on good authority 



X40 DECi^ AND FIELD 

that he once told an intimate friend that it 
was his custom upon going into action to 
retire first to his cabin and, falling on his 
knees, to ask God to give him the victory. 
I feel that any word of mine is inadequate 
to portray his truly noble qualities to the 
reader that knew him not. 

The other day I addressed a letter to an 
old companion of the Pay Corps in those 
long-ago days, Harry Anderson, of Portland, 
Maine, who was paymaster of the Commodore 
Perry, I cannot better close this hastily pre- 
pared sketch than by quoting from his reply : 

I was glad to hear from you, and your letter 
brings up such a host of recollections that I feel 
as if I must answer it at once. . . . 

You are quite right in saying that full justice 
has never been given to Flusser, and I am glad to 
hear that steps are being taken to place him where 
he belongs. He looms up in my recollections as 
one of the most picturesque figures of the war, 
and his eagle eye and thirteenth-century face are 
as distinct to me now as if I had seen him yester- 
day. You know that I was in daily contact with 
him for more than a year, and was his friend, 
companion, and confidant during the whole time. 
I had not only the greatest admiration for his 
exceptional qualities as a brave and gallant com- 



CHARLES WILLIAMSON FLUSSER 141 

mander, but I had also a great love for him as a 
man and a comrade. It seems to me at this day 
as if I have never seen a man in whom the kingly 
and heroic qualities were so beautifully combined 
with almost a womanly softness and tenderness. 
I should be glad to give the Department any data 
they may want in my possession, and if I can be 
of the slightest service in emphasizing the valua- 
ble and truly heroic lesson of his life, I shall only 
be glad to do so. 

The writer closes with the remark that I 
am sure you will be glad to hear: — 

Strangely enough, I have myself for some 
time been contemplating the preparation of a 
paper on Flusser to read before our Loyal Legion 
Commandery. 

**# William Henry Anderson (Bowdoin, 1857) died at 
Portland, Maine, on December 26, 1908. It is to be re- 
gretted that this noble-hearted man did not carry into effect 
his purpose of reciting the story of Flusser's career in the 
Sounds of North Carolina, and of setting forth the ele- 
ments of character which made that officer a naval hero. 
No one could have drawn the portrait in lines more true to 
nature. A paper entitled " Blockade Life," read by Ander- 
son in 1892, before the Maine Commandery (War Papers, 
volume ii), attests his capacity as a graphic yet faithful 
narrator. He was a splendid example of that type of 
young, college-educated men who entered the Navy for 
temporary service in the day of their country's need. Brave 
and courteous, every officer in the squadron who met him 
liked him from the start. 



142 DECK AND FIELD 

The judicious writer of an obituary sketch in the Port- 
land Press of December 28, 1908, dwells with special 
emphasis upon the gallant conduct of this officer when 
the Commodore Perry had grounded in the Chowan River, 
and rebel riflemen with deadly aim had driven our men 
from the decks. Anderson coolly exposed himself as a 
target more than once in order to carry the wounded to 
a place of safety. "There are probably few," says this 
writer, " of those who knew Paymaster Anderson most inti- 
mately, who, during his lifetime, ever heard of this inci- 
dent in his war history. ... By the older men of Port- 
land, those who look back to the period antedating the 
civil war, who knew Mr. Anderson when he first came to 
this city to study law, who were his companions in the so- 
cial gatherings of that day, he will always be remembered 
as their beau-ideal of an American gentleman. . . . He 
was retiring, gentle, kind-hearted, thoughtful of the feelings 
of others ; and when the weight of years came to add bur- 
dens to his load, his older friends could see no appreciable 
change in his manner or his spirit from the Harry Ander- 
son they had known in ante-bellum days." 

See Appendix VI, for a letter of reminiscences of Flusser, 
written by his friend and classmate at the Naval Acad- 
emy,— Joseph Nelson Miller, now (1909) Rear Admiral, 
U. S. N., retired. 



X 

WILLIAM McKINLEY 



X 



ADDRESS BEFORE THE DISTRICT OF 
COLUMBIA COMMANDERY OF THE 
MILITARY ORDER OF THE LOYAL 
LEGION OF THE UNITED STATES 

IN MEMORY OF DECEASED COMPANION, 
FORMER BREVET-MAJOR WILLIAM Mc- 
KINLEY, U. S. V. (PRESIDENT OF THE 
UNITED STATES), NOVEMBER 6 1901 

Commander and Companions : — 

We met here, last spring, and said good- 
bye to one another, looking forward to the 
pleasures of vacation and of distance from 
the city during the summer, and looking 
forward, also, with genuine pleasure to com- 
ing here, at the opening meeting, and grasp- 
ing hands fraternally and with affection. 
How little did any one suspect at that meet- 
ing that this first meeting of the series 
would be devoted, as it is here to-night, to 
a subject in which our hearts well up with 
grief! Truly, "God moves in a mysterious 
way, His wonders to perform." 

We must look through all the sadness, 



146 DECK AND FIELD 

and all the grief, and all the trouble, and 
see the meaning behind. As Companion 
Hawley said at the beginning, it is easy to 
speak of William McKinley. You have got 
to speak right out of your heart, and "tell 
you that which you yourselves do know," 
and you speak into other men's hearts who 
have the same feeling. It is nothing new you 
tell; and it meets with a quick response, 
because fortunately here, in this audience 
at least, we all knew William McKinley. 

One of the wonderful characteristics of 
the man was that God gave him opportunity 
to come into personal contact, and into 
affectionate relations, with a larger number of 
his countrymen and countrywomen, proba- 
bly, than any other American who ever lived. 
It was not simply that he was President of 
the United States, but because he had a heart 
that went out to every citizen of the United 
States, high or low. 

We like, when we try to dwell in memory 
on the character, — and that is what lives of 
a man after the body has passed away, — we 
like to try and analyze that character, and 
see if we can find some one salient point that 
seems to typify the man. When we come 



william Mckinley X47 

to apply this process to William McKinley, 
we shall find that if there were one quality 
he exhibited above all others, it was that of 
sincerity. 

I was thinking this over, this afternoon, 
and walking in company with my chief, Sec- 
retary Long, who was dear, I know, to 
President McKinley. I spoke to him of it, 
and I asked him if it were not so, that there 
were two characteristics of our late Presi- 
dent which were very marked — the one 
simplicity and the other sincerity. "Yes," 
said the Secretary to me ; "but are not those 
two the same thing ? " I reflected a moment, 
and I replied, " Yes." It is the sincere man 
who is simple — simple in his character and 
simple in the expression of that character 
to others. He told me — and he had a 
right to tell me because of his friendship 
with the President, for no man knew him 
better — that I was right in attributing to 
him as a predominating trait that most ex- 
cellent quality of sincerity. 

Now, William McKinley — and many of 
you here knew him as well, and some of 
you better, than I — had this peculiar habit : 
When you went to him, aside from business, 



i 4 8 DECK AND FIELD 

and even on business, you found very quickly 
that he was turning the subject from him- 
self to you. Almost the first question he put 
to you was regarding yourself and your dear- 
est interests ; and that was spontaneous and 
natural with him, because he was a man who 
found his happiness in making others happy. 

I suppose that we have never had in public 
life a man who exemplified that trait as Pre- 
sident McKinley did. This curious result 
has followed : I think if you talk about Pre- 
sident McKinley to any man who knew 
him, that man will, you shall find, venture 
to believe that somehow the President was 
a little closer to him than to anybody else. 
I believe he impressed you, when you were 
with him, with that feeling. It was not an 
illusion ; it was born of the relations which 
existed at that time between you and him ; 
he had so loving a heart. 

Now this I am sure is not mere senti- 
ment. It is true, genuine, and real ; and that 
very thing, it seems to me, in the character 
of William McKinley is bequeathed to his 
countrymen as a precious legacy, that will 
be fruitful of good to this country for years 
and years to come. 



WILLIAM McKINLEY 149 

Just think of the influence, upon the 
country at large, of the death-scene, which 
has been spoken of so feelingly by those 
who have preceded me. The last words, or 
almost the last words, of that man were 
" Good-bye " — not that alone — " Good-bye 
all!" That little word; how significant! It 
took in everybody, and everybody in the 
land felt that he was thought of by the Pre- 
sident in that supreme moment. 

The other day, as I was passing near the 
White House, I saw one of the faithful at- 
tendants coming along, grief depicted in his 
countenance, and I shook hands with him 
for the second time (for I had done it only 
a few days before), and sympathized with 
him. I spoke to him of these words. His 
face lighted up, and he said: "That was the 
remark that the President made to all of us 
when he left the White House." So I infer 
that it was a common remark with him. 
But how beautiful at such a time was that 
one word " all." It was typical of the man's 
nature. 

I see placed here on these walls most ap- 
propriately pictures of the three great Amer- 
icans on whom we shall rely in future 



150 DECK AND FIELD 

generations as exemplifying the best traits 
of the American people. How dissimilar, 
and yet how alike are they ! Washington — 
and the interesting fact in regard to Wash- 
ington is that we to-day know him better 
than our forefathers did. The real Washing- 
ton is depicted to us as he was not to them ; 
Washington, who seems to have been se- 
lected by Divine Providence to bring this 
country out of its trials and place upon a 
firm foundation a free people. 

Then Lincoln, that wonderful man with 
an infinite fund of practical sense, yet with 
a vein of poetry and womanly tenderness in 
him; a strange mixture, raised up at that 
period ; the only man, probably, who could 
have guided us through those perilous times. 
It would seem as though Washington and 
Lincoln had exhausted all those qualities 
of greatness possible to Americans, as their 
country's representatives in the chair of the 
Presidency. 

And then the face of McKinley! 

It was the fortune of William McKin- 
ley, strangely enough (for there were no 
signs of it when he entered upon his office), 
to guide this country through the perils of 



william Mckinley i 5 i 

another war. He was at the head of the 
government; a peril greater than war con- 
fronted this country, for a new departure 
had come upon us. The wisdom and the 
capacity, the patience and the practical good 
sense that characterized every act of his 
proves that he was the right man in the 
right place, though the time has not, per- 
haps, come yet when we fully understand it. 
Had McKinley living gone out of office, 
it would have been to look back upon a 
remarkably successful and wise administra- 
tion. God willed that it should not be thus 
— that there should be the story of his 
wonderful death. In generations to come 
those scenes will be rehearsed. Nothing can 
ever surpass the heroism, the Christian forti- 
tude, the thoughtfulness and unselfishness 
with which William McKinley met his fate, 
and passed from this world to another. 



XI 

john McAllister schofield 



XI 



memorial tribute to deceased 
companion lieutenant-general 
john McAllister schofield, u. 
s. a., ex-commander-in-chief of 
the military order of the 
loyal legion of the united 

STATES 

PREPARED FOR THE COMMANDERY OF THE 
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, AND REPORTED 
JANUARY i 1908 

When a man of unusual distinction goes 
out of the world, leaving behind him a record 
of achievement that is one unbroken line of 
success, we are apt to refer much of his good 
fortune to the circumstance that he had pur- 
sued the life-work that best suited him. The 
inference, in most instances, is doubtless 
correct. Now and then, however, an indi- 
vidual appears whose display of ability in 
-many directions is so marked that it occurs 
to us to speculate a little ; and we inquire, 
How came this man to make the choice that 



156 DECK AND FIELD 

he did ; and what measure of success is it 
likely that he would have attained, had he 
selected some other pursuit ? 

John McAllister Schofleld was a many- 
sided man. A great soldier — had fate as- 
signed him another road upon which to 
travel, he still would have reached emi- 
nence. He would surely have made his mark 
as a lawyer or a judge had he studied law, 
as when a boy it was his purpose to do; 
for it was by the merest accident that an 
appointment to West Point fell to him. 
Had he turned to teaching as a profession, 
he would undoubtedly have become an edu- 
cator of the very first rank. In a word, the 
youth had in him the making of a great 
man. 

Fortunately for his country, our friend 
chose the profession of arms. His fitness 
for that profession, and the services which 
he has rendered, have been the subject of 
judicious and well-deserved praise. That his 
military efficiency was of an unusually high 
order is generally conceded. Had opportu- 
nity favored, there is reason to believe that 
Schofleld would have taken rank as one of 
the world's great commanders ; for he was 



john McAllister schofield 157 

endowed with that rare combination of qual- 
ities that means success in the problem of 
planning a campaign and handling a great 
army in the field. 

So brave and skillful a general did he 
prove himself, that one may very readily be 
excused for overlooking the fact that there 
exists another side to Schofield's record 
which is deserving of special mention — 
and that is, his aptitude for performing the 
duties of a statesman. 

Let me briefly refer to one or two spheres 
of activity, wherein he did work of inesti- 
mable value. When we remember that Gen- 
eral Schofield had scarcely reached the age 
of thirty-five at the close of the war, we may 
well feel surprised at his having accom- 
plished in the field so much that could have 
been done only by a soldier of cool head 
and matured judgment. Indeed, this quality 
of an admirable self-control is a marked 
feature of his character. 

He proved to be just the man that was 
needed during the very trying period of 
reconstruction ; but before his talent was 
availed of in this direction, he had been 
selected by Secretary Seward to go abroad 



158 DECK AND FIELD 

upon a diplomatic mission of the highest 
importance. In June, 1865, he went to 
France, empowered to act largely upon his 
own discretion in determining the means 
of conveying to the Emperor a plain intima- 
tion that the French Army had best get out 
of Mexico without further delay. The fact 
that a duty so delicate in its nature should 
have been intrusted to him, of itself testi- 
fies to the worth and ability of this modest 
soldier. 

Coming home after a year's absence, he 
was called into the cabinet of President 
Johnson, where he served efficiently as Sec- 
retary of War. He knew and understood 
Andrew Johnson far better than did the 
vast majority of Northern men. While Sec- 
retary he demonstrated his fitness for the 
position of President of the United States, 
though it is not at all likely that an idea 
of reaching that position had ever entered 
his mind. Few men have possessed in a 
higher degree than he the habits of thought 
and the training needful for that exalted 
office. Firm, but not opinionated ; industri- 
ous, and yet knowing how to dispatch busi- 
ness expeditiously ; broad-minded so as to 



john McAllister schofield i 59 

view all parts of the Union with like inter- 
est and devotion ; and above all, entertain- 
ing a profound respect for law and author- 
ity, such a man as General Schofield fully 
met, it seems to me, the exacting qualifica- 
tions necessary for a successful administra- 
tion of the Presidency. 

He was no politician, but a straightfor- 
ward, open-hearted officer of the Army. His 
instincts were sound; his loyalty unques- 
tioned; his knowledge of human nature 
far-reaching and thorough. Public questions 
with which he had to deal he examined 
most carefully. To his vision the limit be- 
tween the military and civil authority was 
precisely defined. No man revered the Con- 
stitution more. He was a firm believer in 
the endurance of democratic institutions, 
and in the assured happy fortune of his 
country for the future. 

We gain an insight into the character of 
our companion, not only from the record 
of what he did in the field, and in the cabi- 
net, but from an interesting and valuable 
book that he gave to the public, about ten 
years ago, entitled " Forty-six Years in the 
Army." 



160 DECK AND FIELD 

Here, to any one who reads between the 
lines, there is plainly disclosed the strength 
and fibre of General Schofield's character. 
He modestly tells the reader that he has 
meant this volume to be nothing more than 
a contribution of material for the future his- 
torian. The entire absence of self-laudation, 
the generous estimate of his companions in 
arms, the clear, lucid narrative, and the calm, 
impartial tone of his comments, all combine 
to stamp the author as a man of unselfish 
disposition and of fine intellectual endow- 
ment. 

The calibre of the man is distinctly shown 
in what he tells us in this book as to the 
Board of Review, over which he presided in 
1878, constituted to hear new evidence in 
the case of Major-General Fitz-John Porter. 
Here Schofield did what it was difficult to 
do — rose above prejudice. He expresses it 
as his opinion that " no government can 
be regarded as just to its Army unless it 
provides, under appropriate conditions, for 
the rehearing of cases that may be tried by 
court-martial in time of war." 

The strong sense of justice displayed in 
advancing this opinion is worthy, it needs 



john McAllister schofield 161 

hardly to be observed, of the highest com- 
mendation. General Schofield exercised a 
clear insight into the proper methods of 
securing efficiency in the Army. He loved 
his profession, and he gave his best thought 
to the means of steadily improving that 
branch of the service, of which he was so 
conspicuous an ornament. 

To conclude, we may praise the late 
Commander-in-Chief of the Loyal Legion 
of the United States without fear of passing 
the bounds of a just and well-founded ad- 
miration. The secret of his success is that 
he was a man of abounding common sense. 
It is matter of history that during a period 
of many years, when from time to time his 
duties kept him at Washington, public men 
of the Cabinet, or of the Senate, or of the 
House, used to resort to him to ask his opin- 
ion upon questions then before the country. 
They always found him sagacious, compe- 
tent, and helpful. Schofield was a most use- 
ful man. He did his whole duty faithfully. 
His name and his fame will ever be a pride 
to the Army, and to every lover of the 
Union. 



XII 

MEMORIAL DAY 



XII 

MEMORIAL ADDRESS DELIVERED AT 
PORTSMOUTH NEW HAMPSHIRE 

BEFORE STORER POST NO. 1 GRAND ARMY 
OF THE REPUBLIC MAY 30 1892 

Again does this land, from ocean to ocean, 
witness the inspiring sight of a people lay- 
ing aside the cares and the strife of their 
working-day existence, to unite in one vast 
chorus of gratitude to the memory of the 
saviors of their country ; and of invoca- 
tion and praise to Him who giveth us the 
victory, who hath the nation in His keep- 
ing. 

Memorial Day! How solemn, and yet 
how sweet its associations! Solemn, for it 
bids us pause and measure, each for him- 
self, the duty that he owes in person to a 
common country. Sweet, since it opens the 
flood-gates of memory to a tide of tender 
emotion, and brings before us in the bloom 
of his early manhood, his face aglow with 
patriotic ardor, the comrade, the friend, the 



166 DECK AND FIELD 

brother, who welcomed death in order that 
the Union might live. 

Our heroes — can we ever forget them! 
In churchyard ; on rugged hillside ; in smil- 
ing valley; by the corner of the field on the 
old homestead ; on many a lonely spot far, 
far away from kindred; in the serried ranks 
of cemetery, cared for and watched over 
by a Nation, or in graves unknown, they 
lie sleeping — a mighty host! The bosom 
of this historic soil shelters not a few, in 
whose perpetual honor stands yonder fig- 
ure, on base of New Hampshire granite. 
In the fullness of strength, erect and proud 
with high resolve, they went forth out of 
these streets to do battle for the Union. 
It was at the call of duty that they went, — 
duty, — 

Stern daughter of the voice of God. 

Silently now do they all await the dawn- 
ing of the last, great day. 

We would fain keep green the memory 
of each soldier and sailor, and thank him for 
what he did, and for what he was. And so, 
at this glad season, we search out his last 
earthly resting-place ; and reverently, with 



MEMORIAL DAY 167 

eye not undimmed, we lay God's own flowers 
there. 

A simple act. But oh, how eloquent to 
voice a gratitude profound for all that their 
loyalty, their valor, their nobility of soul 
has rendered possible for us, and for our 
children's children ! 

And you, my friends of a later genera- 
tion, you, who are too young to have heard 
the echoing guns of the great struggle ; you, 
who can picture to yourselves the scenes of 
that mighty conflict, only because you have 
drunk in the story from books, or given ear, 
it may be, while some elder has recited the 
tale, — did not you, too, feel the warm blood 
pulsating through your veins, when to-day it 
was permitted you to look upon the ranks 
(now, alas, fast thinning !) of the veteran sur- 
vivors, as once more in military order they 
have followed the flag to the music of fife 
and drum ? 

It was a custom with the Athenians, at 
the end of a campaign (so Thucydides tells 
us), to bury in the beautiful suburb of Ce- 
ramicus, with public honors, the bones of 
those who had fallen in battle. A vast con- 
course of mourners and spectators, upon the 



168 DECK AND FIELD 

occasion of these solemn rites, listened in 
the open air to the eulogy pronounced by 
some eminent citizen, whom they had chosen 
as their orator. Such were the circumstances 
under which Pericles delivered his renowned 
funeral oration, where occurs that sublime 
passage : " Of illustrious men the whole 
earth is the sepulchre, signalized not alone 
by the inscription of the column in their 
native land, but in lands not their own, by 
the unwritten memory which dwells with 
every man of the spirit more than of the 
deed." Hearken to the majestic Webster, 
in like strain, addressing his countrymen at 
Bunker Hill : " We are among the sepul- 
chres of our fathers ; we are on ground dis- 
tinguished by their valor, their constancy, 
and the shedding of their blood." And it 
was to inspire the living, no less than to 
honor the dead, that Abraham Lincoln ut- 
tered words at Gettysburg that the world 
now knows by heart. The democracy of to- 
day, like that of the past, yields its highest 
honors to him who has deserved well of his 
country. 

Yes, a deep and pervading sentiment of 
our nature bids us keep alive the name and 



MEMORIAL DAY 169 

the fame of each brave spirit who has laid 
a last, great sacrifice upon the altar of coun- 
try. It is the element of unselfishness in the 
deed that makes it gracious. " Greater love 
hath no man than this, that a man lay down 
his life for his friends." Our Revolutionary 
fathers, and the preservers of the Union, 
alike are consecrated in the hearts of the 
American people. The former gained our 
liberties, and made self-government a living 
reality. The latter rescued self-government 
from threatened overthrow, and set it upon 
the firm foundation of an indissoluble Union. 

The War of the Rebellion will ever re- 
main a landmark in the history of civili- 
zation ; for it was a conflict between two 
phases of civilization, — between the slavery 
of a past, and the progress and enlighten- 
ment of a new, era. But the occasion forbids 
our dwelling upon the meaning of the war 
itself. To-day our thoughts cluster around 
some fair-haired youth, who yielded up his 
life on field or deck. 

To live over again those days, which in 
misty recollection seem but a dream, — the 
leaving home and its endearments ; the ready 
submission to discipline in camp, on the 



170 DECK AND FIELD 

march, on shipboard ; the patient endurance, 
the wondrous fortitude in hospital, in prison, 
in the hour of battle ; the equal (nay, was it 
not ofttimes the greater ?) heroism of those 
at home, — parents who bade their sons God- 
speed, young wives their husbands, and then 
turned to take up without murmur the daily 
burden of absence, awaiting with blanched 
cheek the bulletins from the front ; and, at 
last, accepting, with a resignation born of 
lofty courage, the dread tidings that left no 
ray of hope. To revive these scenes — what 
is it but to kindle afresh in our hearts the 
sacred flame of love of country? 

For the part that New Hampshire took 
in putting down the Rebellion, her record 
shines with a lustre that time shall never 
dim. When our misguided brothers fired 
the fatal shot at Sumter, fortunately for the 
State, she had in the person of her chief 
magistrate a man of energy, and a patriot of 
purest instinct. He lost not a moment in 
parleying about forms of statute authority. 
He acted. He shouldered responsibilities, 
and he did it with alacrity. While the coun- 
try claims him as a bright star in the galaxy 
of war governors, this community in no nar- 



MEMORIAL DAY 171 

row sense shares in the honor that invests 
his name. As, in 1776, Portsmouth gave 
one of her merchants — John Langdon — 
to the cause of the Revolution ; so, in 1861, 
she gave to the Union that peerless defender 
of the flag — Ichabod Goodwin ! 

What troops were sent more promptly into 
the field than hers ? What better equipped, 
better cared for? The skill and intrepidity 
of her officers, the valor and endurance of 
her men — where, I ask, where in military 
annals are they surpassed ? When, for exam- 
ple, soldiers from other parts of the country 
spoke of New Hampshire's "gallant Sec- 
ond " and "fighting Fifth," they meant to em- 
ploy no mere holiday epithet. Of the former 

— a regiment mustered into service here, 
and to which this city furnished a company 

— I have lately been told an incident that 
shows of what stuff our brave boys were 
made. It was at the battle of Groveton, bet- 
ter known as the second battle of Bull Run. 
Without a support, the Second New Hamp- 
shire, consisting of but little more than three 
hundred men, was to attack the enemy at 
a most dangerous position. My informant, 
Private Dillon of the color company, heard 



i 7 2 DECK AND FIELD 

each word that his colonel uttered, indeli- 
bly engraved as it ever since has been upon 
his memory : " Soldiers of New Hampshire, 
your country expects desperate work of you 
to-day ! Cast not one thought toward home. 
Think of God and your country. Stand firm 
as your granite hills!" Then rang out the 
order for the charge; and Gilman Marston 
asked no man to go where he himself was 
not ready to lead the way ! With sustained 
impetuosity the line of bayonets swept for- 
ward, in spite of fearful loss. So superb was 
the onset that Stonewall Jackson, whose 
men gave way, was moved to speak of it in 
terms of generous admiration. 

Did time allow, how gladly would we call 
up the name and the figure of each brave 
son of Portsmouth, who, at the call of his 
country, sprang to arms. Let me allude, how- 
ever, to one shining exemplar, as the perfect 
type of an unstudied hero, a true soldier, a 
knight beyond reproach. Well do I remem- 
ber him. An athlete, full-chested; an eye 
beaming with animation ; a voice deep, but 
gentle; in manner, courteous, — his noble 
physique was the fit home of the graces of 
a Christian gentleman. If ever a man gave 



MEMORIAL DAY 173 

to the State in her hour of need all that he 
had, unsullied by a thought of self, it was 
he. Suited to command, with the opportu- 
nity only too readily open to him to hold a 
commission, he chose to serve in the ranks. 
To enlist in a company of sharpshooters, 
he walked hence to Concord and back. The 
field of Gettysburg, crimsoned with the blood 
of so many a martyr to the cause of human 
liberty, saw no spirit more noble wing its 
flight than that of our lion-hearted towns- 
man, Henry Lakeman Richards. 1 

How shall we breathe a long farewell to 
three wearers of the blue, whom to-day we 
specially miss ; into whose familiar faces we 
never again may look ; three, who, after at- 
testing their manhood in the field, sheathed 
the ,sword to prove that, valiant as soldiers, 
they could be no less worthy of admiration 
as citizens, — Hodgdon, Thatcher, Good- 

1 " I enlisted Richards at Concord ; and from the day I 
first met him till his death, I had the greatest respect for 
him. I never was in his presence but I was impressed 
with his superior qualities as a man and patriot." — MS. 
letter, Major Edward Thomas Rowell, of Lowell, Massa- 
chusetts, February 1, 1893. "Richards Avenue," Ports- 
mouth, is named after him. He selected the young trees, 
and with his own hand planted them on either side of this 
long street leading to the cemetery. See Appendix VII. 



1^4 DECK AND FIELD 

rich ! Faithful in arms, as ye were respected 
and honored in life, so are ye now mourned, 
and lovingly remembered. 

The laurels of the Navy, how fair a share 
belongs to the Pascataqua! Would that we 
might enter even so much as upon the 
threshold of the narrative; might tell of 
many a stately ship, her guns thundering 
for the stars and stripes, whose virgin keel 
had kissed the waters of this beautiful river ; 
might tell of the sturdy arms and stout 
hearts of sailors, whose home was on these 
shores, from the days of John Paul Jones 
— down to the splendid achievement of 
the ever memorable Kearsarge. Would that 
I might speak of Craven, born here, who 
went down with his ironclad, scorning to save 
his own at the cost of another's life. " After 
you, pilot!" is his glowing eulogy. Of Far- 
ragut, who here breathed his last, leaving a 
fame secure. Of him who fought the Brook- 
lyn, that other Craven, who returned hither 
to pass declining years, amid the scenes he 
loved so well in boyhood. Of Storer and 
Pearson, of Parrott and Pickering, of Thorn- 
ton, of Bradford, of Yates, and of many an- 
other gallant soul, who served his country 



MEMORIAL DAY 175 

well. Long be their memory cherished ! 
May a sense of their sterling virtues inspire 
generations yet to come ! 

The crowning lesson that the personal 
heroism of the war period teaches, you have 
already anticipated. It is the lesson of the 
supreme force of the moral idea in public 
affairs. When rebellion came, it found the 
people of the Union States busily engaged 
in the work of developing a magnificent em- 
pire. We were extending our lines of traffic, 
subduing the prairie, building railroads, 
calling into being towns — destined to grow 
into populous cities. The South had been 
led to believe that here was a race of money- 
getters, with instincts not extending beyond 
love of gain; that "the Yankees" would 
purchase peace at any price. Such an illu- 
sion, if it ever existed at the North, vanished 
with the smoke of that first rebel gun that, 
in the harbor of Charleston, dared send its 
iron message of treason to insult the flag. 
The uprising of the people to defend that 
flag, the outburst of patriotic enthusiasm — 
who that witnessed the spectacle, who that 
felt the thrill, can find words wherewith to 
tell of it to another ? 



176 DECK AND FIELD 

That love of country, blazing like beacon- 
fire on mountain-top, and then burning with 
the steady glow of a pure, vestal flame of 
the temple, — think you it came all sud- 
denly into men's hearts ? Should time have 
it in store (far distant be the day !) that the 
Republic in her need shall call upon her 
sons to defend her against a foreign foe, 
think you that the ardor, and the sacrifice, 
of a patriot's devotion will be wanting ? 

But what application, you ask, has this in 
time of peace ? What has love of country to 
do with practical every-day affairs ? It has 
everything to do, my friends ; and let me 
tell you how it manifests its presence. 

First and foremost, a man must realize 
that he has a country; realize that he has 
been put into the world to live, not for him- 
self and his family alone, not for a little 
circle of immediate friends and neighbors 
— but for humanity; that the range of his 
duty reaches out far beyond the borders of 
his own town — beyond his State, clear to 
the confines of the dwelling-place of a whole 
great Nation. 

The man who loves his country learns 
to look upon an American as his brother. 



MEMORIAL DAY 177 

If the crop be bountiful in Kansas, he shall 
rejoice ; if floods devastate a region of the 
Mississippi, he shall sorrow and hasten to 
give aid. He does not shut his eyes to what 
goes on in the world around. He thinks 
that he has no right to immerse himself in 
private business, to the total neglect of pub- 
lic duties. He is a good citizen. "A good 
citizen" — the term is full of meaning to 
him who stops and reflects. He goes to the 
caucus ; he goes to the polls, and votes ; and 
he does it in the proud conviction that he is 
exercising the privilege of a freeman. With 
a jealous eye he guards that privilege. He 
asks himself, What are my public duties ? 
What can I do, here and now, as my part 
in preserving, and transmitting to my de- 
scendants, this heritage inestimable of self- 
government ? 

He reverences the names of Washing- 
ton and of Lincoln. He is a firm believer 
in democratic institutions. He trusts the 
people ; and though occasionally a wave of 
popular feeling sets, as it seems to him, in 
the wrong direction, he does not wring his 
hands and despair of the Republic. Is he 
called to fill public office — he aims to serve 



178 DECK AND FIELD 

the people, not himself. Has he sons — he 
brings them up as Americans. He does not, 
in senseless phrase, tell them that theirs is 
the greatest and best country in the world ; 
he rather points out to them the many 
blessings guaranteed by the Constitution; 
explains the advantage that the youth of 
America have over those who are growing 
up in foreign lands ; and bids them with 
grateful heart be true to the doctrines that 
the fathers have made the foundation-stones 
of our national edifice. 

Is it not plain that "the moral idea" ani- 
mates and vitalizes all that is best and high- 
est to-day in our public life ? Does not the 
same spirit that made men heroes in '61 
abide with us still ? 

Members of the Post, you who are spared 
to take part in these befitting exercises, 
your presence testifies that at this very 
moment the love of country burns not less 
dim in your hearts, than in the hour when 
you faced the shot and shell of a brave and 
desperate enemy. The sight of you is itself 
an inspiration to duty. 

Young men, just entering upon the respon- 



MEMORIAL DAY 179 

sibilities of life, do not dismiss love of country 
from your thoughts, as a thing unpractical, 
fanciful. Look deeper. Study the example 
of that noble fellow who carried a mus- 
ket in the days of a nation's peril. Satisfy 
yourselves what it was that bade him leave 
home, nerved him to face danger and suffer 
untold hardship ; what it was that has earned 
for him, living or dead, a gratitude that 
only grows deeper and firmer, as the years 
go by. Learn that what sweetens the toil, 
alike of the humblest laborer and of the 
most exalted statesman, is an abiding sense 
of duty loyally performed. 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX 



WILLIAM THOMAS SAMPSON 

Rear Admiral William Thomas Sampson, 
U. S. N., died at his home, on New Hampshire 
Avenue, Washington, on the afternoon of Tues- 
day, May 6, 1902, in the sixty-third year of his 
age. The Washington " Times," of the following 
morning, published a tribute, written by the author 
of the address, as follows : — 

The death of Rear Admiral Sampson, in circumstances 
singularly pathetic, will fix public attention upon the re- 
markable qualities of the man, and upon the real value of 
the services he has rendered his country. Not to all the 
people has a knowledge of the real Sampson been disclosed. 
The closer his character is studied, the higher will be the 
praise gratefully accorded to him. 

The American people in due time will come to admire 
this brave commander, even as the officers and men of his 
command have always admired and loved him. Sampson's 
name and fame, it is clearly to be perceived, will steadily 
grow. His memory will be cherished in our history as one 
of our best and noblest heroes. 

The Admiral was a man of marked intellectual force. He 
was a thinker and a close student. At the Naval Academy 
he stood at the head of his class. He went back as an in- 
structor, — one of the best who ever taught there. Later, 
he became Superintendent ; and he has left the imprint of 



i8 4 APPENDIX 

his teaching and example upon many a younger officer of 
the Navy, who will grieve at the news of his death. 

Our Navy has never boasted of a finer ordnance officer 
than William Thomas Sampson. He had a talent for in- 
vention, and he was fertile of ideas in his chosen profes- 
sion. But beyond his accomplishments as a theoretical 
officer, he was a true sailor, — a fine, all-round officer on 
shipboard. 

When put in command of the North Atlantic Squadron, 
he showed at once that he was the man for the place. The 
ability displayed by him at this post was of the highest 
type. He knew the art of war. He was a man to be trusted. 
He served his country faithfully. Patient, untiring, resource- 
ful, and determined, Sampson was absolutely fearless. 
What is more, he had the gift of inspiring those under him 
with a sense of perfect confidence in his power to lead them 
on to victory. 

Those who knew him best could not but admire the for- 
titude with which he bore the burden of the last years. It 
was not so much that he faced a physical breaking-down, 
which told of sure-coming death, but he was heartsick. 

Many of his countrymen had not been permitted to know 
the simple truth of his unselfish, unremitting devotion to 
duty. Yet he murmured not. He was content that the Presi- 
dent, the Secretary of the Navy, and the great body of his 
fellow-officers, as well as the men of his command, held 
him in the esteem that was his of right. 

He has gone to his reward. A gallant gentleman, true 
as steel, — an honor to the service, and to his country. 



II 



BUELL'S LIFE OF JOHN PAUL JONES 

" Paul Jones, Founder of the American Navy : 
A History. By Augustus C. Buell " (2 volumes), 
was published in 1900 by Charles Scribner's Sons. 

A second edition appeared in 1901, which con- 
tains two additional chapters : one giving a copy 
of Jones's will, the other telling of unsuccessful 
efforts on the part of Colonel Sherburne to find 
the body of Jones. 

A third edition, published after the author's 
death, contains a supplementary chapter by Gen- 
eral Horace Porter, recently Ambassador to France, 
descriptive of the search instituted by him, and the 
finding of Jones's body in what was formerly the 
Protestant Cemetery in Paris. 

Buell's book, written in an attractive style, and 
dealing with the stirring events in the life of a hero, 
much of whose career had been enveloped in a haze 
of mystery and romance, gained at once a marked 
degree of popular favor. Quite as a matter of 
course, it was everywhere accepted as authority. 
All the more so, because the earlier lives of Paul 
Jones had proved to be unsatisfactory. 

Buell ( 1 847-1904), first a civil engineer and 
afterwards a journalist, already had won repute in 



186 APPENDIX 

Washington as an active, bright newspaper cor- 
respondent. Since 1883, he had served as secre- 
tary to Charles H. Cramp of Philadelphia, the 
well-known shipbuilder. It is understood that Mr. 
Cramp took an interest in Buell's literary enter- 
prises, and that he helped the author financially 
in the preparation and publication of this ambi- 
tious work. 

A great shock it was, therefore, to the admirers 
of Buell's book to encounter an expose in a com- 
munication to the New York " Times," of Sunday, 
June 10, 1906. The article is entitled "A Ficti- 
tious Paul Jones Masquerading as the Real. The 
accepted life of the naval hero by A. C. Buell pro- 
nounced to be an audacious forgery." 

The author of this startling indictment is Mrs. 
Reginald De Koven, wife of the celebrated com- 
poser, who sets out in precise terms the charges 
she has to make. Each charge is followed up with 
proof from documents, in such terms as do not fail 
to carry conviction to the reader. Mrs. De Koven's 
language is well guarded and temperate. There is 
no animosity exhibited toward the offender, though 
plain words are used, because they have to be. 
Buell's statements, one after another, are examined 
and shown to be false. 

" The book," the article says, " is now accepted 
as the authoritative and official life of Jones, but 
it can be proved to be the most audacious histori- 



APPENDIX 187 

cal forgery ever put upon a credulous public. . . . 
It is padded with inventions of clever construction 
and of unparalleled audacity. It contains reports 
of imaginary committees in Congress, invented let- 
ters from Washington, Franklin, and Hewes, false 
letters and extracts from imaginary journals of 
Jones himself, false entries from the diaries of 
well-known persons, such as Gouverneur Morris 
and the Duchesse d'Orleans, and quotations from 
others which existed only in Colonel Buell's ima- 
gination." 

Serious as is the accusation, and emphatic as 
are these and like words of the critic, no one who 
follows Mrs. De Koven's communication to the end 
will fail to be convinced that she is fully justified 
in making the exposure — indeed, that she is only 
doing her duty. 

At present, however, we are concerned solely 
with the question of the authenticity of the letter 
to Hewes of date of September 14, 1775 (at pages 
32 to 37 of the first volume), purporting to enu- 
merate the qualities that are needed in an officer 
of the Navy. That the text as printed by Buell is 
most remarkable, and worthy of unstinted admira- 
tion, is apparent. The prophetic character ascribed 
to it would vanish, or at least be sensibly dimin- 
ished, should it turn out that Paul Jones, as a 
matter of fact, wrote no such letter to the North 
Carolina member of Congress. 



188 APPENDIX 

Mrs. De Koven, after assuring us that all the 
letters to and from Hewes used in Buell's book 
are forgeries, " invalidated by disagreement in date 
with the authentic letters, or by glaring discrepan- 
cies with true historical documents," invites at- 
tention to the singular fact that numerous letters 
from Paul Jones to Hewes are preserved in the 
John Paul Jones Collection of the Library of Con- 
gress, and that not one of these authentic docu- 
ments has been used by Buell. It does, indeed, 
seem strange that Buell should announce the com- 
position of a Congressional Committee where the 
records upon consultation disclose the fact that no 
such Committee ever existed. He says that June 
*$> l 77$> Congress appointed a provisional Ma- 
rine or Naval Committee. He gives the names of 
several members of the Committee, and then states 
that on the 24th of June the Committee authorized 
the Chairman " to invite John Paul Jones, Esq., 
Gent., of Va., Master Mariner, to lay before the 
Committee such information and advice as may 
seem to him useful in assisting the said Committee 
to discharge its labors." 

When we have ascertained that the records show 
beyond any question that no naval legislation took 
place in Congress until October 13, 1775 ; that no 
such committee as described was ever appointed, 
and that the invitation to Jones is wholly imagi- 
nary, we may well be amazed. That a deception 



APPENDIX 189 

should be undertaken, which was capable of being 
so easily exposed, can scarcely be credited, yet such 
is the fact. 

Buell's " Life of John Paul Jones " is likely to 
become a cause ctfebre to literature. All readers of 
that book who learn of this exposure must agree 
with Mrs. De Koven in recognizing the cleverness 
with which the author's course of deception has 
been pursued. It is a pity that Mr. Buell should 
have persuaded himself to enter upon such a scheme 
of invention. His gift of literary expression would 
have insured success to his Life of the great sea 
fighter, had he rigidly adhered to recorded facts. 
As it is, he is seen to take a basis of truth and then 
proceed to construct thereon in part a narrative 
after his own conception of what should befit his 
hero. Of course, in such an undertaking, he could 
not hope long to escape detection. These revela- 
tions will inevitably have the effect of modifying 
in some degree the views as to the personality and 
character of the great naval hero that one may have 
formed after previously having read the almost fas- 
cinating pages of Buell. 

Fortunately, what John Paul Jones achieved was 
far too great to admit of the slightest tarnishment 
of his fame from any act of a biographer. Fortu- 
nately, too, we are cited to clear proof that Paul 
Jones entertained a splendid yet just conception 
of the American naval officer ; and moreover that 



190 APPENDIX 

he impressed this conception upon the minds of 
many public men of that period. 

In view of this unhappy exposure, the reader 
will learn with a lively satisfaction that, notwith- 
standing the fact that the text of the letter printed 
by Buell was never written by Jones, its leading 
sentiments (referred to with praise in the Naval 
War College Address) are those of Jones himself. 
The letter, after all, may be pronounced to have 
been made up substantially from the actual writ- 
ings, at divers times, of John Paul Jones. We may 
safely say that the ideas conveyed in the famous 
letter really had been given out (but not at so early 
a date) by John Paul Jones as forming in outline 
what he believed to be the true type of an officer 
of the Navy of the United States. 

This gratifying intelligence was first brought to 
my attention by the accomplished Librarian of the 
Navy Department, Mr. Charles W. Stewart, a grad- 
uate of the Naval Academy of the Class of 1881, 
who would himself have been in the service to-day, 
but for the ill-advised legislation of Congress which 
retired from the Navy almost every member of 
that now famous class. It is highly probable that 
no one in this country has enjoyed a better opportu- 
nity for getting at the facts in the history of John 
Paul Jones, or has actually made a more exhaustive 
study of the subject, than Mr. Stewart. At my re- 
quest, he has kindly written me the following letter: 



APPENDIX 191 

Navy Department, 
Library and Naval War Records, 
Washington, D. C, 

September 15, 1908. 

My dear Mr. Hackett, — Referring to our con- 
versation of this day regarding Buell's book, "Paul 
Jones, Founder of the American Navy : A History," 
and the alleged letter dated September 14, 1775, from 
Jones to Hon. Joseph Hewes (printed on pp. 32 to 37, 
vol. i), it is fair to say that Mr. Buell made a readable 
book without research and study of historical docu- 
ments. 

As to the alleged letter dated September 14, 1775, 
Jones never wrote it. The author has cleverly com- 
bined many ideas which appeared in Jones's letters of 
a later date, written after study and experience of naval 
affairs. In short, he prepared a synthesis of good sug- 
gestions made by Jones and presented the whole as 
having been written in 1775. The first paragraph on 
page 34 is copied almost verbatim from the letter of 
Jones to Hewes, April 14, 1776. Other portions are 
paraphrased from various later letters of Jones. 

The ideas set forth in this alleged letter are pre- 
sented in substance in his authentic letters, and Jones 
was quite worthy of it in later years than the date 
given by Buell. 

Jones was an earnest student of naval affairs, his- 
tory, strategy, and tactics. He had the instincts of a 
gentleman. His letters to Lady Selkirk were not ad- 
dressed directly to her, but were enclosed with a letter 
of transmittal to Lord Selkirk. 

Mr. Buell presented a pen-picture of Jones that 



I9 2 APPENDIX 

attracted the attention of General Horace Porter and 
resulted in the search for, and almost miraculous re- 
covery of, Jones's body, and its transfer to America. 
Respectfully, 

Charles W. Stewart. 

Hon. Frank W. Hackett, 

Washington, D. C. 



POSTSCRIPT 

The story, on page 53, of certain young ladies of Ports- 
mouth presenting a silk flag to John Paul Jones, naturally 
enough found a place in the remarks on Flag Day, since 
I had then but recently read of it in Buell's book, i, 244- 
245; ii, 78. It now appears to be a pure fabrication. 

Pay Director Joseph Foster, U. S. N. (retired), who has 
made a special study of naval affairs occurring at his home 
town of Portsmouth, assures me that there is no historical 
evidence whatever to confirm it. See Boston Evening 
Transcript, " Notes and Queries," May 13, July 1, and 
December 23, 1905, August 17 and 24, 1907, and February 

21, I908. 



Ill 



PETER HAGNER 



Judge Hagner's father, alluded to on page 51, 
as an official in the Treasury Department under 
Secretary Hamilton during President Washing- 
ton's administration, was Peter Hagner, born at 
Philadelphia, October 1, 1772. He died at Wash- 
ington, July 16, 1850. His service under the gov- 
ernment was remarkable not only for the length 
of time during which he held a very responsible 
office, but for the character and extent of the 
labor performed. For fifty-seven years continu- 
ously he conducted affairs in the Treasury De- 
partment with such signal ability and unblemished 
repute, that it was said of him, just after his death, 
that no greater praise could be bestowed upon a 
man than to declare that "he is as virtuous as 
Peter Hagner." 

The son of a Revolutionary soldier, young 
Hagner in 1793 entered the office of the account- 
ant of the War Department, as a bookkeeper. 
He soon became principal clerk ; and later was 
made an additional accountant of the War Depart- 
ment, by President Madison. In March, 18 17, 
when the office of Third Auditor of the Treasury 
had been created, President Monroe appointed Mr. 



i 9 4 APPENDIX 

Hagner to that position. Peter Hagner accom- 
plished a vast amount of work with such fidelity 
and skill that his merits became known all through 
the country ; and upon two occasions Congress, by 
a vote, expressed their appreciation of the quality 
of his labor. In 1799, he went to Washington 
in advance of the removal of the government ar- 
chives. These papers and documents were brought 
from Philadelphia to Washington in one or two 
small sailing vessels. Mr. Hagner in person super- 
intended the work of their reception and dispo- 
sition. He kept a diary in which are numerous 
entries of no little interest to the public. 

Judge Hagner has signified his intention of using 
this diary, together with some of the letters and 
an autobiographical sketch of his father, in the 
preparation of a volume to deal with the early 
history of the Capital. Surely the long-continued 
faithful services of this estimable man entitle him 
to grateful remembrance. 

In connection with the subject of the stretch 
of time through a period of history, possible with 
father and son, it is interesting to note that Judge 
Jeremiah Smith (1837-), professor at the Har- 
vard Law School, who is now (January, 1909) at- 
tending to his duties there, is the son of a soldier 
who fought under General Stark (August, 1777) 
at the battle of Bennington. The father, Jeremiah 



APPENDIX i gs 

Smith (1759-1842), distinguished as a member of 
Congress, Governor and Chief Justice of New 
Hampshire, holds rank among great American 
lawyers ; and it is enough to say of the son that 
he has proved himself worthy of such a sire. 



IV 



THE FARRAGUT TABLET AT THE PORTS- 
MOUTH NAVY YARD AUGUST 26 1908 



PRAYER OFFERED BY CHAPLAIN FRANK 
THOMPSON, U. S. N. 

O God, we thank Thee for the greatness of this 
nation not only in battle but in peace. 

We thank Thee for the good examples of those 
whose devotion to service on land and sea has 
helped to make our country what it is, and who, 
having finished their course in faith, do now rest 
from their labors. 

We thank Thee that Thou hast put into our 
hearts the desire and will to render becoming 
honor to those heroes by recalling their names and 
deeds. 

We pray that they may be to us an example in 
teaching us what it means to have a country and 
the glorious privilege of serving the same. 

May the memory of him whose name and deeds 
we recall this day be an incentive to us and to 
our children to uphold in peace as well as in 
war the honor of our nation, that Thy blessing 



APPENDIX 197 

may rest upon it now and throughout the years to 
come. 

May Thy blessing rest upon this tablet about to 
be unveiled. May loving hearts that read its story 
thank Thee once again for the signal services ren- 
dered by him whose name it bears. May it prove 
a living voice speaking to us all of that duty of 
service which we owe to our country and to Thee, 
our God, a service by whose faithful performance 
do we hope to be joined hereafter with those who 
have gone before in glory everlasting, through 
Jesus Christ, our Lord. 

II 

remarks of admiral george dewey, u. s. n. 

Ladies and Gentlemen — Companions of 
the Loyal Legion, Comrades of the 
Grand Army — and Brother Officers : — 

This is indeed a pleasant and important occa- 
sion for me. I feel honored and gratified to be 
permitted to assist in the ceremony of unveil- 
ing this tablet to the memory of our great naval 
hero. I knew Admiral Farragut well, and I loved 
him. 

For two years during the Civil War I was close 
to him. At one time he had his temporary quar- 
ters on board the Monongahela, where I served as 



I9 8 APPENDIX 

lieutenant. I saw much of him during the siege of 
Port Hudson. The accommodations were limited 
and the Admiral spent a great deal of his time on 
deck, where I had many opportunities of observing 
his manner of conducting duty, his admirable ad- 
ministrative qualities — and his amiability. 

He was my ideal of what a naval commander 
should be. Without my realizing it at the time, I 
was taking him as my ideal. Since then, on more 
than one occasion, when in a trying position 
of great responsibility, requiring prompt action, I 
have said to myself, " What would Farragut have 
done in these circumstances ? " I do not say that 
I did what Farragut would have done, but I did 
what I thought he would have done. I felt confi- 
dent that in following him I was doing what was 
right. 

I could go on telling you about Farragut, but 
the tablet is here and that tells of him. To me 
was given the privilege of writing the words 
"Faithful and Fearless." These words are my 
tribute. They express my summing-up of his char- 
acter. Faithful in every walk of life — and Fear- 
less beyond compare. 



APPENDIX 199 



III 



LETTER OF REAR ADMIRAL JOHN CRITTENDEN 
WATSON, U. S. N., READ BY CAPTAIN MOORE AT 
DEDICATION OF FARRAGUT TABLET 

Pendennis Club, Louisville, Ky., 
August 14, 1908. 

To Captain E. K. Moore, U. S. Navy, Command- 
ant Portsmouth Navy Yard, Portsmouth, N. H. 

My dear Moore, — I am writing, on the an- 
niversary of Admiral Farragut's death, to again 
express our thanks to you and your good, kind 
wife for your hospitable invitation to us — my 
wife and daughters and self — to be your guests at 
the unveiling of the tablet, in memory of Admiral 
Farragut, on the commandant's house, in which he 
died August 14, 1870. 

We are very sorry not to be able to come and 
help in this tribute by our presence. 

You ask me to write some reminiscences to be 
read at the unveiling. I am a very poor hand at 
writing anything ; but I will try to jot down a few 
of my recollections of our great and noble Admiral 
for you to read if deemed appropriate. 

It was on one of the last days of January, 1 862, 1 
first had the privilege and honor of meeting Captain 
David Glasgow Farragut, U. S. N., when his square 
blue flag, bearing two white stars, was hoisted at 



2oo APPENDIX 

the mizzen truck of the U. S. steam sloop-of-war 
Hartford at the old Philadelphia Navy Yard. All 
her officers, assembled on the quarter-deck of that 
graceful-looking vessel, were introduced, one after 
the other, to the Flag Officer, and when, in my 
turn, I was introduced as Master John C. Watson, 
the sailing-master, he took my hand and with the 
greatest consideration drew me to one side, say- 
ing he was sorry for my disappointment and to 
have me lose the service ; but that he had been in- 
formed by the Department that the navigator was 
to be detached and a grandson of Mr. Crittenden 
ordered in his place. I thanked him and told him 
I was the lucky man. 

He was about five feet, seven inches in height, 
well built and muscular, though slender and grace- 
ful in figure. He made a charming impression on 
me almost at once, and I think he must have done 
so on the others, as a gentleman, kindly, genial, 
of wide sympathies, and winning and vivacious in 
manner and conversation, and very alert and active 
both mentally and physically. At this time I was 
less than nineteen and one half years of age, and 
the lapse of years, with intimate official and personal 
relations, not only confirmed this early impression, 
but has added ever-deepening admiration and love 
for him as a man, an officer, a hero, and a friend. 

After his flag was hoisted, it very soon became 
evident to all hands that the Flag Officer was 



APPENDIX 201 

keenly observant of everything affecting the effi- 
ciency of the personnel and of the equipment, and 
it was not long before that knowledge encouraged 
and stimulated men and officers, from our gallant 
Captain Richard Wainwright to the youngest lad 
on board. I took advantage of every opportunity 
my duties as navigator allowed to be near the Flag 
Officer, to see and hear him as much as possible. 
I can never forget how, on one occasion while we 
were proceeding to the Gulf for the first time, he 
relieved my mortification and comforted me after 
having just convinced me of an error in calculat- 
ing the ship's position. Seeing I felt very sore, he 
looked up at me with an arch smile and said, " All 
men are liable to mistakes, and some women." 

I believe he had a great natural aptitude as 
a pilot ; but if not, he had acquired great skill as 
such and liked to practice piloting whenever he had 
a chance. He used to caution me not to despise 
or scorn any kind of knowledge, telling me that 
any one who mastered a business, whatever it be, 
may be able to impart something of value to an 
observant and receptive naval officer, which may 
come in handy in some of the many varying phases 
of his service. From all I know, or have heard of 
his life, after he became a man he appeared to have 
made the most of every opportunity to make him- 
self the fittest possible for any and every service 
he might be called on to perform. He told me he 



202 APPENDIX 

acquired knowledge of great use to him profession- 
ally, while serving on shore duty at navy yards as 
one of the officers and later as commandant. I never 
knew a more approachable man, and it seemed 
to hurt him to have to refuse a request. Captain 
Drayton, his flag captain, who also acted as fleet 
captain, was much troubled on several occasions 
that the Admiral did not say " No," when Captain 
Drayton thought it should have been said. And 
he remarked to me on one of them, "I did not 
believe a man could be a great man if he could n't 
say no ; but here is one truly great who cannot." 

He was remarkably quick in all his movements 
up to 1864, and a skillful swordsman who enjoyed 
a set-to with single sticks even after he was in 
command as a captain. On his birthday he used 
to test his suppleness by holding the toe of his left 
shoe with his right hand while he hopped over it 
forward and backward. I feel quite sure he did 
this July 5, 1863 ; but his health failed very much 
in the summer of 1864. The strain of the delay 
and the difficulties and uncertainties embarrassing 
the preparations for the battle of Mobile Bay, 
following the long strain of his long and active 
service, had undermined his strength. 

As I look back on it now, it seems to me it was 
a very short time after his flag was hoisted on the 
Hartford that he inspired practically all of us on 
board with absolute confidence in him and in what- 



APPENDIX 203 

ever he might undertake. This soon became very 
noticeable. 

The closing words of his general order published 
for the guidance of commanding officers in attack- 
ing and passing Port Hudson, March 14, 1863, are, 
in my opinion, very characteristic of the man, viz. : 
"And I think the best defense against the enemy's 
fire is a well-directed fire from our own guns, shell 
and shrapnel at a distance, and grape when within 
four hundred or five hundred yards." 

He was sincere and straightforward in all his 
ways, pure, without guile, and very generous and 
tender-hearted. 

I have endeavored to give you a few of my re- 
collections of my service with Admiral Farragut, 
whom his son, with absolute truth and justice 
writing the record, shows to be " equal in bravery 
with Nelson and in purity with Collingwood and 
as skillful as both of them." 

Respectfully, 

J. C. Watson, U. S. N. 



THE THOMPSON TROPHY AT THE UNITED 
STATES NAVAL ACADEMY 

The influence of well-directed physical exercise 
in bringing youth into the fullness of a sound and 
true manhood is rated, as we all know, at a higher 
value to-day than it used to be half a century ago. 
Of course, a good deal remains to be learned in 
the field of teaching athletics, just as there is in 
other branches of education, but every step taken 
here in the right direction has its importance. 

We are happy to be able, in these pages, to 
record the beginnings of an enterprise that means 
much in the training of the young gentlemen of 
the Naval Academy. One of their best friends, 
Robert Means Thompson, of New York City, pre- 
sented a cup to the United States Navy (Auxiliary) 
Athletic Association, on Saturday, November 19, 
1895, as a trophy for the midshipman who should 
be declared to have done the most during the year 
preceding for the promotion of athletics at the 
Naval Academy. 

The presentation exercises took place at the 
Gymnasium, upon the conclusion of a football game 
with Lehigh. Many ladies were present, together 
with officers and the " cadets " — as the midship- 



APPENDIX 205 

men were then called. The founder of the trophy 
said a few words, substantially as follows : — 

This cup I take great pleasure in giving to the Athletic 
Association as a trophy. Each year there is to be inscribed 
upon it the name of the man, selected from the corps of 
midshipmen, here at the Academy, as the man who during 
that year has done the most for athletics. He is not neces- 
sarily the best athlete, but he is the man who, either by his 
enthusiasm, or by his directing and controlling power, or 
by the encouragement of his example, has prompted others 
to engage in athletics. 

The graduates of this Academy differ from graduates of 
the ordinary college in this, that, while the product of the 
civil university should be a scholar, the graduate of this 
Naval Academy shall be a fighting scholar. It is an abso- 
lute duty, therefore, of those who study here — to make use 
of all their physical powers. 

Toward the end of a man's career, when he stands upon 
the bridge of a battleship, engaged in action, should his 
nerve fail him, should his eyes prove defective, should he 
find his body does not have strength to endure the neces- 
sary strain, then, no matter if he knew all the sciences, and 
all the mathematics, and all the languages, his career would 
prove a failure. 

There is a duty imposed upon every midshipman at the 
date when he enters the service to look forward to the 
possibility of having to protect his country's flag and his 
country's honor. Does he fail to prepare himself so as to 
be able to make the best physical struggle in the day of 
battle? Then that man fails in the highest duty that he 
owes to this school — the highest duty that he owes to his 
country. 

Let me be understood as wishing the course of athletics 
here at the Academy so regulated that the gain that comes 
from preparation for contest shall not be confined to the 



206 APPENDIX 

few. I would have an intelligent interest in athletics create 
and maintain an enthusiasm amongst all the graduates. 
All will be benefited by the practice of sports. It is in this 
spirit, and for this reason, that I have wished the name se- 
lected to be that of the man who shall have done the most 
to encourage athletics generally amongst all the men at the 
Academy. 

The cup is of solid silver, twelve inches high, and 
eight inches in diameter, with three handles represent- 
ing dolphins. The three faces are chased with views of 
football, baseball, crew race (with cruiser New York 
and Sandy Hook Lighthouse in background), and 
fencing-match ; also engraved with six seals of the 
Naval Academy, the Navy Auxiliary Athletic Associa- 
tion, and the Class of '68. Around the top of the cup 
is engraved on the three faces the following : — 

U. S. N. A. A. A. : THOMPSON : TROPHY : 

On a topsail on one face there is the following in- 
scription : — 

Presented by Robert M. Thompson, '68, to 
the U. S. Navy Auxiliary Athletic Associa- 
tion AS A TROPHY ON WHICH TO INSCRIBE EACH 

year the name of the cadet who shall be 
declared by its executive committee to 
have done the most during the year pre- 
ceding for the promotion of athletics at 
the Naval Academy 

The following are the names which have been in- 
scribed upon the cup [December, 1908], to be seen 
by the public, at Annapolis : — 



APPENDIX 207 

Year. Name. Class. Athletic Work. 

1893 Bookwalter, C. S.. '94 Football. 

1894 .... Kavanagh, A. G . . . '94 Football. 

1895 Karns, F. D '95 Football, Track, Crew. 

1896. . . .Palmer, L. C '96. . . .Crew, Football, Track. 

1897 Powell, J. W '97 Football, Crew. 

1898 Halligan, John, Jr.. '98 Football, Crew. 

1899. . . .Taussig, J. K '99 Football, Track. 

1900 Berrien, F. D '00 Football, Baseball, Track. 

1901 .... Williams, Roger. . . '01 Football, Crew. 

1902 Nichols, N. E '02 Football, Crew. 

1903 Poteet, F. H '03 Football, Baseball. 

1904 Halsey, W. F., Jr. . '04 Football. 

1905 .... Farley, L. C '05 Football, Crew. 

1906 Howard, D. L '06 Football. 

1907 Spencer, H. L '07.. ..Football. 

1908 Douglas, A . H '08 Football, Baseball 



VI 



LETTER OF REAR ADMIRAL JOSEPH NELSON 
MILLER, U. S. N., GIVING REMINISCENCES 
OF LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER CHARLES 
WILLIAMSON FLUSSER, U. S. N. 

After the paper on Flusser had been read to 
the Commandery of the Loyal Legion, Compan- 
ion Joseph Nelson Miller, Rear Admiral, United 
States Navy (retired), upon request, kindly wrote 
out some recollections of his friend, covering the 
period when the two were midshipmen at the 
Naval Academy. The Admiral's valuable letter, 
which shows a clear insight and due appreciation 
of certain qualities of young Flusser's character, 
is as follows : — 

The Champernowne, 
Kittery Point, Maine, August 7, 1900. 

Dear Mr. Hackett : — I am under many obli- 
gations to you for your courtesy in permitting me 
to read your very interesting paper on " Flusser 
and the Albemarle" 

Some thirty-eight years or more have elapsed 
since I last saw Flusser, and, of course, many of 
the incidents that occurred during the two occa- 
sions we were thrown together as instructors at 
the Naval Academy have been forgotten. We had 



APPENDIX 209 

rooms in the bachelor's quarters, and became very- 
intimate, and, although there was a difference of 
only three or four years in our ages, he often spoke 
to others of me as his younger brother. I had the 
greatest admiration for his character as an officer 
and a gentleman, and for his many varied attain- 
ments, and showed this by my deference to his 
opinions and advice. He was generous to a fault, 
although not a spendthrift, and I never knew him 
to be guilty of an ungentlemanly or mean act. 

Unfortunately, he left no picture of himself that 
would convey to strangers the kind of man that he 
was. My recollection of him is that he was about 
five feet, seven and a half inches in height, slim in 
build, and of a graceful, erect figure. His face indi- 
cated the strength of his character, and his eyes 
were large, bright, and expressive. When he smiled, 
he showed his white teeth slightly through his 
small, brown moustache, and his expression was 
most winning and kindly. When angry, he showed 
in his face a determination of character that con- 
vinced me of the truthfulness of some of the stories 
that I had heard of his courage in his younger 
days. 

While we were associated together he was tem- 
perate in all his habits, never drinking even 
wine. When dining out, he would raise the glass to 
his lips without showing to others that he was 
not following their example. He was quick in his 



210 APPENDIX 

movements, and very active. I have seen him 
stand at the foot of my bed and spring onto the 
bed backward over the foot-board, which came to 
the small of his back. Sometimes, in going out of 
the grounds, he would tell me to take the gate, 
and then he would scale the high wall like a cat, 
and be waiting for me at the gate. 

He possessed an excellent mathematical mind, 
and I am sure he would have made himself a 
famous mathematician if he had turned his atten- 
tion in that direction. He was fond of good books, 
and had many of the best within his reach. He 
had a deep, well-modulated voice, was something 
of an elocutionist, and an excellent reader. He 
would take up a prayer-book in my room and read 
portions of the beautiful service in that book as 
I had never heard it read before, and that, too, 
without affectation of style or manner. He could 
quote many passages of Shakespeare accurately 
and with striking effect, and I often thought, if he 
had so wished, he could have made himself a great 
tragedian. He made a study of words and their 
correct pronunciation, and to aid him he divided 
up a dictionary for convenience of handling, and 
would take pleasure in making himself familiar 
with the latest authority. 

Flusser was cool under all circumstances, and 
apparently without nerves ; but he once told me 
that he was naturally of a nervous temperament, 



APPENDIX 211 

and had made up his mind not to show he was 
under excitement, no matter what occurred ; his 
will-power was so great that he was able, in the 
end, to carry out his determination. During the 
exciting times of the breaking-out of the Civil 
War, he was on one occasion in my room, and 
we were overhauling our revolvers. After cleaning 
his, he was lowering the hammer, when his thumb 
slipped, the cartridge was exploded, and the bullet 
just grazed my head and was buried in the win- 
dow-casing behind me. Flusser, although he must 
have been much shocked, merely arched his eye- 
brows, which was his wont, and said, " My dear boy, 
I nearly killed you " ; and then turned so that I 
could not see his face, laid the revolver down on 
the table, and was silent and thoughtful for some 
hours afterwards. 

Flusser had a great deal of dry humor in his 
composition, and was sometimes given to harmless 
practical jokes. One hot night he came into my 
room, draped in his white uniform, and asked me 
to take a walk. I declined, saying that I had some 
studying to do, when he replied, " That is right, 
my boy. Keep ahead of the youngsters." He 
went out and returned in an hour or so, smiling. 
When I asked him the cause of his amusement, he 
said that he had gone out to the cemetery to see 
the tombs of some of his relatives, and while there 
had sat down on one of the vaults, which, by the 



212 APPENDIX 

way, was the same one in which, some years after- 
wards, I temporarily placed his remains, that had 
been sent to my care from their first burial-place. 
After having been seated for some time, he said, 
meditating upon what the future had in store for 
him, he rose, went to the entrance of the cemetery 
to go out, when a negro passed across the field 
a short distance from him. The man caught sight 
of him, gave an unearthly yell, and started for the 
shanties in Lockwoodville, with Flusser chasing 
him. As he came near the houses, one of the doors 
opened and the man disappeared within. Flusser 
turned and walked away ; and when he had fin- 
ished his story to me, he said, laughingly, that the 
darky would repeat to his dying day that true 
ghost-story. 

I have related this trifling incident merely to 
show that Flusser was not that austere and seri- 
ous man that strangers sometimes thought him. 

Your estimate of Flusser is so accurate that I 
fear I have added little to it, but I send what I 
have written, as it has given me much pleasure to 
recall to my mind an old friend whom I loved, 
and one honored by all that knew him. 
Very truly yours, 

J. N. Miller. 

Hon. Frank W. Hackett, 

Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 

Navy Department, Washington, D. C. 



APPENDIX 213 

# * # A valuable paper on Flusser by Charles 
W. Stewart will be found in " Proceedings of the 
United States Naval Institute," volume xxxi, for 
June, 1905. It contains several letters written by 
Flusser from the Sounds of North Carolina, and 
bears this appropriate title: "Lion-Hearted Flus- 
ser : A Naval Hero of the Civil War." 

^*^ The Navy Department have recently (1908) 
named a torpedo boat the Flusser, in memory of 
this officer. 



VII 

HENRY LAKEMAN RICHARDS 

Henry Richards is one of the unknown heroes 
of the war. The more that his character is studied, 
the higher it mounts in the esteem of those who 
recognize the meaning of true patriotism. Ports- 
mouth may well take pride in the record of such 
a noble spirit. 

The following extract from an address, delivered 
July 26, 1863, by Joseph Hiller Foster, at the 
Unitarian Sunday School, Portsmouth, is worthy 
of such preservation as this little volume may 
promise for it. Mr. Foster, himself one of the 
best of men, has not gone beyond the bounds of 
literal truth in the tribute of praise here bestowed 
upon his friend : — 

Of the friend for whose remains I undertook this journey 
[to Gettysburg] I would say a few words; for, although 
never a member of this school, his character was one that 
you may all well take as a model, especially the boys. 

Pure, upright, honest, brave, never as a boy do I re- 
member hearing from his lips any profane or indecent 
word; and as a man all that which was in the least tainted 
with impurity was most abhorrent to him. A lie, or any- 
thing inconsistent with the strictest honesty and upright- 
ness of word or deed, was his utter detestation. Brave 
as any soldier in the army, and meeting his death at last 
because he would not fall back when his comrades did, he 



APPENDIX 215 

yet feared sin ; nor did he ever, even in his youth, regard 
it as any mark of courage to do what he knew was wrong 
or would displease his parents or his God. 

He eminently obeyed the precept: "Be kindly affectioned 
one to another with brotherly love, in honor preferring one 
another." His little acts of kindness at home, to neighbors, 
and to all with whom he was connected, were of constant 
occurrence ; himself he did not consider when another was 
to be helped. When at home last winter with a wounded 
leg, he walked several miles to obtain flowers for a poor, 
sick woman, who had not the remotest claim upon him but 
her distress and poverty. His modesty and retiring dispo- 
sition were as conspicuous as his kindness. He refused a 
commission in the Army, saying that he knew he could be 
a good soldier, and that was better than to be a poor offi- 
cer; although friends well knew that whatever position he 
might take he would fill it well. But for him the toils of life 
are over ; for him we can well quote the hymn : — 

Go to the grave ; at noon from labor cease ; 

Rest on thy sheaves, thy harvest task is done ; 
Come from the heat of battle, and in peace, 

Soldier, go home ; with thee the fight is won. 



INDEX OF NAMES 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Adams, John, 63, 65, 66. 
Adams, Samuel, 64. 
Allen, Charles Henry, 4, 5. 
Anderson, William Henry, 140, 
141, 142. 

Barry, John, 105. 
Bates, Alfred Elliott, 86. 
Berrien, Frank Dunn, 207. 
Blakewell, Allan Campbell, 85. 
Bonaparte, Charles Joseph, 101. 
Bonaparte, Napoleon, 9. 
Bookwater, Charles Sumner, 

207. 
Bradford, Joseph Morgan, 174. 
Bradford, Royal Bird, 86. 
Breckinridge, Joseph Cabell, 

49, 86. 
Browne, James Edwin, 86. 
Buell, Augustus C, 25, 26, 

185-192. 
Buffington, Adelbert Rinaldo, 

86. 
Butts, Frank Albert, 86. 
Byron, John, 104. 

Cervera, Pasquale de, 34. 
Chadwick, French Ensor, 19. 
Chandler, William Eaton, 26, 

102. 
Chichester, Sarah Ellen Du- 

lany, 102. 
Collingwood, Cuthbert, 203. 



Cooke, James Wallace, 137, 

138. 
Cramp, Charles Henry, 186. 
Craven, Robert Carter, 102. 
Craven, Thomas Tingey (1), 

no, 174. 
Craven, Thomas Tingey (2), 

102. 
Craven, Tunis Augustus Mac- 

donough, 77, 102, no, 174. 
Crittenden, John Jordan, 200. 
Cushing, William Barker, 137. 

Davenport, Henry Kallock, 117, 

123, 127, 129, 131,132. 
Decatur, Stephen, 12, 28. 
De Koven (Mrs. Reginald), 

Anna Farwell, 186, 187, 188, 

189. 
Dewey, George, 7, 73> 74. 78, 

197-198. 
Dewey (Mrs. George), Mildred 

McLean, 73. 
Dickinson, John, 65. 
Dillon, Michael Augustus, 171. 
Douglas, Archibald Hugh, 207. 
Drayton, Percival, 202. 

Eldridge, Watson William, 86. 

Farley, Louis Calott, 207. 
Farquhar, Norman Van Held- 
reich, 3. 



220 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Farragut, David Glasgow, 12, 
73-81, 197-203. 

Farragut, Loyall, 73. 

Farragut (Mrs.), Virginia Loy- 
all, 73- 

Flusser, Charles Williamson, 
1 15-142, 208-213. 

Flusser, Guy, 121. 

Flusser, Ottaker, 121. 

Foster, John Gray, 124. 

Foster, Joseph, 192. 

Foster, Joseph Hiller, 214. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 66, 187. 

French, Charles A., 125, 129, 
136. 

Goodrich, Casper Frederick, 26. 
Goodrich, Edwin Ruthven, 173. 
Goodwin, Ichabod, 171. 
Greer, James Augustin, 51. 

Hackett, Frank Warren, 86, 

192, 208, 212. 
Hagner, Alexander Burton, 50, 

102, 193, 194. 
Hagner, Peter, 193-194. 
Halligan, John, Junior, 207. 
Halsey, William Frederick, 

Junior, 207. 
Hamilton, Alexander, 51, 193. 
Hargis, Thomas G., 135. 
Hawley, Joseph Roswell, 146. 
Henry, Patrick, 63. 
Herbert, Hilary Abner, 41,102. 
Hewes, Joseph, 25, 187, 188, 

191. 
Hibben, Henry Bascom, 108. 
Higginson, Francis John, 20. 
Hodgdon, George Enos, 173. 
Hoke, Robert Frederick, 139. 



Howard, David Stewart Hoxie, 

207. 
Hull, Isaac, 12, 76. 

Irwin, Noble Edward, viii. 

Jackson, Thomas Jonathan, 

172. 
Jefferson, Thomas, 65, 66. 
Jewell, Theodore Frelinghuy- 

sen, 86. 
Johns, Arthur, 101. 
Johnson, Andrew, 158. 
Johnson, Samuel, 14. 
Johnston, Joseph Forney, 41. 
Jones, John Paul, 12, 25, 26, 

28, 44, 52, 53, 54, 55, 76, 95, 

174, 185-192. 
Jones, William, 109. 

Karns, Franklin D., 207. 
Kavanagh, Arthur Glynn, 207. 

Lancaster, Joseph, 29. 
Langdon, John, 76, 171. 
Lee, Richard Henry, 65. 
Lee, Samuel Philips, 122, 139. 
Lemly, Samuel Conrad, 86. 
Leutze, Eugene Henry Coz- 

zens, 101. 
Lincoln, Abraham, 80, 150, 168, 

177- 
Livingston, Robert Robert, 65, 

66. 
Locke, John, 29. 
Long, John Davis, 41, 147. 
Loud, John Sylvanus, 86. 
Loyall, William, 73. 
Luce, Stephen Bleecker, 3, 22, 

26. 



INDEX OF NAMES 



221 



Lynch, William Francis, 118. 
Lyon, Gideon Allen, 86. 

McKinley, William, 87, 145 

15'- 

McKinley (Mrs. William), Ida 

Saxton, 87. 
Madison, James, 193. 
Marston, Gilman, 172. 
Mason, James Murray, 51. 
Meade, George Gordon, 93. 
Meade, Henry Meigs, 91. 
Meade, Richard Worsam (1), 

92, 93- 
Meade, Richard Worsam (2), 

54, 85-97. 
Meade, Robert Leamy, 91. 
Miller, Joseph Nelson, viii, 142, 

208-212. 
Milton, John, 29. 
Monroe, James, 193. 
Moore, Edwin King, 74, 199. 
Morris, Gouverneur, 187. 

Nelson, Horatio, 203. 
Nichols, Neil Ernest, 207. 

Orleans, Duchesse d', 187. 
Otis, James, 63, 

Palmer, Leigh Carlyle, 207. 
Parrott, Enoch Greenleaf, 174. 
Patrick, George Henry, 86. 
Pearson, George Frederick, 

174. 
Peck, John James, 128. 
Pennock, Alexander Mosely, 

73- 
Pennock, Mrs., 73. 
Perry, Oliver Hazard, 28. 



Pestalozzi, Johann Heinrich, 

29. 
Pickering, Charles Whipple, 

174. 
Porter, David Dixon, 116. 
Porter, Fitz John, 160. 
Porter, Horace, 185, 192. 
Poteet, Fred Halstead, 207. 
Potter, Robert Brown, 124. 
Powell, Joseph Wright, 207. 
Preble, George Henry, 108. 

Remey, George Collier, 36. 
Richards, Henry Lakeman, 

173, 214-215. 
Roe, Francis Asbury, 9. 
Rollins, Frank West, 41. 
Rowell, Edward Thomas, 173. 
Russell, John, 6. 
Rutledge, Edward, 65. 

Sampson, William Thomas, 7, 
20, 26, 35, 41, 183-184. 

Schofield, John McAllister, 
155-161. 

Selkirk, Lady Helen, 191. 

Semmes, Raphael, 41. 

Seward, William Henry, 55, 

157. 
Sherburne, John Henry, 185. 
Sherman, Roger, 66. 
Sigsbee, Charles Dwight, 86. 
Slidell, John, 51. 
Smith, Jeremiah (1), 194-195. 
Smith, Jeremiah (2), 194. 
Smith, Melancthon, 137. 
Smith, Sydney, 6. 
Spencer, Herbert, 29. 
Spencer, Herbert Lee, 207. 
Stark, John, 194. 



222 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Stewart, Charles West, 190, 

191-192, 213. 
Stockton, Charles Herbert, 3. 
Stoddert, Benjamin, 102. 
Stokes, Thomas Bateman, 132. 
Storer, George Washington, 

165, 174. 

Tatnall, Josiah, 122. 
Taussig, Joseph Knefler, 207. 
Taylor, Henry Clay, 36. 
Thatcher, Joseph Haven, 173. 
Thompson, Frank, 74, 196-197. 
Thompson, Robert Means, viii, 

204-206. 
Thornton, James Shepard, 174. 
Tingey, Thomas, ioi-iii. 
Townsend, Robert, 116, 117. 
Truxtun, Thomas, 28, 105. 



Van Reypen, William Knick- 
erbocker, 86. 

Wainwright, Richard (1), 201. 
Wainwright, Richard (2), 85. 
Walker, Asa, 3. 
Washington, George, 51, 64, 

67, 150. 177. 187, 193. 
Watson, John Crittenden, 74, 

199-203. 
Wayland, Francis, 31. 
Webster, Daniel, 66, 168. 
Wessells, Henry Walton, 127, 

128, 129, 139. 
Wilkes, Charles, 51. 
Williams, Rogers, 207. 
Wilson, James, 65. 

Yates, Arthur Reid, 174. 



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